U.P. students qualify for regional eCybermission competition

LAKE-LINDEN HUBBELL — A group of students from Lake Linden–Hubbell Schools are the first from the area to qualify for the eCybermission regional competition. ABC 10’s Rick Allen explains.

eCybermission is sponsored by the Army Educational Outreach Program and involves students selecting a science or engineering project that will benefit the community.

Using a common method of electroplating, these students were able to pull copper from stamp sand.

7th grader Siona Beaudoin explains, “We let the stamp sand set in acid for a week and then we put the plates in the acid and set up a current and it plated.”

Separating the copper from the stamp sand would have both environmental and economic benefits.

7th grader Will Lyons said, “I hope that it’s able to be used to extract the copper from the stamp sand, and other heavy metals, and hopefully save the lake and bring some profit to the community.”

The students will give their virtual presentation at Michigan Tech on Tuesday, with a chance to move on to the finals in Washington D.C.

MTU’s Senior Lecturer of Engineering Fundamentals Gretchen Hein said, “I teach first year engineering and the report they created is comparable to what my engineering students do, so they did a lot of work. They learned how to write a technical publication, which is very difficult to do. They learned how to cite their references and their sources, and the learned how to plot data. They learned how to analyze the data, so there’s a lot of scientific and engineering value to what they did.”
The students are also eligible to apply for a $5,000 grant to continue their research.

For ABC–10/CW–5 News…I’m Keweenaw Bureau Reporter Rick Allen.