Kamiah Students present “SolidWorks” for Senior Project
Kamiah High School seniors presented their required senior projects to Lewiston-Clarkston manufacturers on May 24th at Clearwater Valley High School in Kooskia.
The students created their own manufacturing enterprises where they manufactured projects for other clubs or individuals on the Kamiah High School campus.
One group focused on an academic engineering and their school based enterprise was called, “Kub Teks.” The other group focused on more hands-on mechanical drafting and machining with their business, “KHT Manufacturing.”
Both groups presented what they had learned, such as the manufacturing process and all the challenges that go along with it. One such challenge was communicating between the client and the manufacturer. Students said that there were many changes that occurred in the design process which was time consuming but necessary to meet the needs of the customer and/or the project.
Besides using SolidWorks, many students achieved professional accomplishments. One student received the gold medal in April at the Idaho State SkillsUSA Competition in Boise. Understanding the importance of SolidWorks in engineering and manufacturing, three of the students passed the Certified SolidWorks Associate (CSWA) exam. They are among a very short list of Idahoans who have this credential.
The students’ are looking forward to their future as they all indicated they plan to attended college in areas related to mechanical engineering, computer science, and automated manufacturing. They credit their exposure to SolidWorks in helping them expand their knowledge base and helping them decide their education and career path. They all said they love using the software!
At the end of the presentation students asked questions of the industry panelists, such as “How do you use SolidWorks?” and “What’s it like in the real world?” Area manufacturers informed the students they use SolidWorks much the same way the students’ did. In fact, their school based enterprises emulated what they do very well, but on a slightly smaller scale.
The manufacturers congratulated the students on a job well done and were very impressed with what the students accomplished. They even commented these students would make great employees.
