Ohio University's passion for helping the city shines through again, taking home first place during the annual AbilityOne Design Challenge this week.
This competition requires
students to design and build a functioning prototype of an assistive device or technology that increases productivity for people with disabilities in the workplace or opens a job to an employee who could not previously perform the job’s associated tasks.
OU’s Flower Power team competed with its very own Lithographic Plate Cleaning Machine to help Passion Works Studio, a division of ATCO, with the cleaning process. Passion Works
had to power wash aluminum lithographic printing plates, but the task was not allowed to be performed by a person who has a disability. The team’s invention changed the cleanup process and made it more safe and accessible for everyone involved at Passion Works.
The team’s hard work paid off in the end, winning first place in the competition.
“We were very excited when we won,” said Marissa Singley a team member of Flower Power. “We were very proud and honored to be a part of this competition.”
Flower Power competed against two teams in the finals at Washington, D.C. Weber State University took home second place and Oregon State University received third.
Stingley agrees that winning first is exciting, but added it was a rewarding experience all around.
“It was nice to make some improvements to people's lives,” Singley said. “Seeing their reaction was fantastic, one of our teammates even became tearful from how proud and accomplished that he felt.”
Each team is made up of seniors, who worked on this project as part of their capstone, and a professor who takes on the role as the team's coach. Greg Kremer, this year's coach, who has been doing this for 15 years, said this year's team is really close, and that the students grow not only academically, but they grow as people.
“Engineers, most of the time, we’re a bit more introverted,” Kremer said. “We tend to like to work with things more than people. It’s hard to get us out of the office or out of the classroom so this project helps work not only as a professional with a customer, but with an individual who has a disability on a personal level. I’ve noticed it had a great impact on their personal development.”
Wayne Savage, studio coordinator for Passion Works, is one to vouch on Kremer’s comment.
“It’s wonderful to work with these students,” Savage said. “This year's design team was great, they were very interested in what our needs were and they spent time at our program, meeting the people there, and they became friends with us. They were very thoughtful and they worked with us every bit of the way.”
Contact Anna Gibbs at ag836912@ohiou.edu.
