Hipp to be Green

The 7th grade technology class is starting to finalize the components for the Solar Environment Lab. The class was broken up into teams; each team was assigned a phase of the project to do research on.

• Team one – solar panels.
• Team two – proposed equipment that is used only with DC current.
• Team three – proposed equipment that is used only with AC current.
• Team four  – will use the Excel program to develop a spreadsheet and chart showing a graph of the cost between using solar or the public utility electrical supply (daily, weekly, monthly and yearly).
• Team five – will take all information gathered by the teams and prepare a Powerpoint presentation.

The class needed to use Ohm’s Law after they obtained the equipment electrical characteristics, to find either the watts or amps used by the equipment.  Once they found all the equipment loads, we were ready to discuss which solar panel size would best meet our requirements.

Team one has found that the Photovoltaic (PV) panels mainly absorb infrared rays of the sun to convert into electric energy. The other rays in light spectrum coming from the sun are not absorbed and is lost as heat. This is what reduces the panel efficiency to between 5 – 18 percent.

Team one is in the process now of finding which company makes the most efficient solar panel and would be cost effective or should they lower the efficiency to bring the cost down. 

The 7th grade technology class is a quarterly (9-10 weeks) class, so portions of the project will not be accomplished during this quarter, but continued in the second, third and fourth quarters with the new 7th grade technology classes.  This is also by design, so I can explore new avenues with the each class.

Mr. Jack Walker is the Supervisor of maintenance and custodial staff at Berlin Community School. I can honestly say that this man is a jack-of-all-trades (no pun intended), but with one exception to that phrase, he is surely a master of all.

Any time the team found the need to bounce ideas around of a technical nature such as for electrical hook-ups, routing of wiring, availability of wind turbine installations locations he was available to provide that information.

Anyone working in a school environment would know how busy the maintenance and custodial departments are during the school year, but Mr. Walker always found time when asked, to give us the proper direction or another viewpoint.

In addition, we asked Mr. Walker to review the wiring diagrams for wind turbine project; he did and made suggestions that improved the outcome of this most successful project.

We installed the wind turbine generator on the roof and for safety; the students were not permitted up there.  Mr. Walker volunteered to come in on his day-off to help the team install the wind turbine on the roof.

The student’s and the instructional team’s appreciation goes out to MR. WALKER with our sincere THANKS.

NOW I remember why I usually don’t start the year off with Geometry, but we are through the basics – area, perimeter and a little volume. When we revisit it later in the year all the students will have been through their tech classes and had some hands on activities with geometry, so hopefully it will go much smoother. 

On with the rest of the year, Tech students will start building the 2nd greenhouse with our “Future Act” students. Future Act is a Group of students that volunteer for various charitable activities in the community. They will also start working on learning about Solar panel use – they will build a solar panel car and test it, along with other activities Wes Hill will discuss in his blogs. 

In math we will start to gather information from Tech to use throughout the year. The info the student’s record with their solar panel activities I will incorporate in the math lessons. Based on last years “Wind Turbine” project some of the concepts we will be able to incorporate from this years Solar Panel project into math are – mean, median and mode, percentage, ratios, rates, scaling, fractions, decimals and percents. With the solar panels and greenhouse we will also incorporate area, perimeter, and volume.

What I will do with each concept is use the Solar Panel project as a reference for what the students are going to do or what they have all ready done. Either way they have a practical application for the math they are learning. I’ll keep you informed to know what worked and what didn’t work.

This week in technology I started by demonstrating to the students how to use a multimeter (digital and analog). I provided the student with different size batteries and asked them to find the appropriate scale to determine if the batteries were good.  Once they felt comfortable with using the multimeter, I provided them with several small solar cells and multimeters so they could get the voltage readings from the cell in different locations throughout the building and outside.  This information was gathered to create a database and make a chart on Excel, in addition to being used to compare the readings from the larger photovoltaic cells that we will install later.

During the instructional portions of the class, the students were told that a solar cell is like a one-way street (diode) and that the electrons can only move in one direction. We also, discuss the construction of the solar cell, quartz sand (silicon) which has been altered by adding other chemical elements (boron or phosphorus). This would create two layers in the silicon with different electrical characteristics.  When light hits the silicon is causes electricity to be produced.

I asked the class to research solar panels and pay close attention to how they are rated. They found out that the capacity ratings for solar panel was in watts and that solar panels can only convert one fifth of the incoming solar energy into electrical energy. 

When you are starting to develop a project and the team is working through difficult problems, such as how to start the project in the first place, project preparation, logistics and cost, you will need encouraging people around you. One such person is Mrs. Kathie Conaway (BCS Elementary Principal).

First, we must thank Mrs. Kathie Conaway, her intelligence and professionalism is only surpassed by her love for the students. When we were thinking about the first project (Wind Turbine Project), she suggested that we apply for a Hipp Foundation Grant and provided a sample copy. Upon completion of the grant application, we asked her if she would review it and of course, see did.

Mrs. Kathy Conaway is planning to retire this December, and I know we will miss that morning smile, the impeccable suits she wears and that soothing voice saying “GOOD MORNING, GOOD MORNING .”  We will sincerely miss her and wish her all the best in her new career – RETIREMENT.