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Students present chair for girl

WARREN — Several sixth-graders at Lincoln PK-8 School were excited as they explained what they and adult helpers did to create an adaptive chair for a first-grade girl with spinal muscular atrophy.

The sixth-grade students, led by teachers Christine DePascale and Stephanie Collier, presented the special chair to Krista Monsman, 7, who uses a wheelchair, at the May meeting of the Warren City Schools Board of Education. Students also explained to board members how they did it with the help of design engineers Adam O’Brien and physical therapist Melissa Pucak as part of a Samsung Solve for Tomorrow competition.

The idea was born when student Makenzie Monsman, 12, spoke about her younger sister, Krista, who was diagnosed in 2013 with SMA and could use such an adaptive mobile chair for exercise and strengthening her muscles.

“This has been a yearlong project,” DePascale said. “We wanted to do something different and a project the students could get involved in using science. We entered the Samsung competition, which presented a problem that needed to be solved.”

The 13 sixth-graders met Fridays after school to work on the project and used a donated chair.

“Kids who like science are the ones who stay after school on Fridays,” DePascale said.

DePascale said the students placed in the top five teams in Ohio in the national Samsung Solve for Tomorrow contest, but did not make the finals. They were competing against high schoolers on other teams.

“Even though they did not make the finals, the students wanted to continue making the project,” she said.

“We were inspired to do this by Makenzie’s sister because she can’t sit very comfortably in a chair because of her spine. She also needs a way to exercise and strengthen her muscles, so we thought of an adaptive chair. Her sister was the inspiration for the project,” DePascale said.

SMA is a disease that robs people of physical strength by affecting the motor nerve cells in the spinal cord, taking away the ability to walk, eat or breathe.

While some of the sixth-graders were on a presentation team — taking pictures, explaining the process and doing a video, the others were on a design team, working with experts to modify an electric wheelchair donated by Children’s Rehabilitation Center in Howland.

Collier said the students took turns explaining the process to the school board and Krista’s family.

DePascale and Collier said the project incorporated working with STEM — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — and local engineering experts.

The national contest challenged students in grades six to 12 to apply STEM to find creative solutions to real-world issues impacting their communities.

“What they did accomplish was phenomenal and I was so very proud of them. They voted to continue working on the project even though they didn’t win,” DePascale said.

bcoupland@tribtoday.com

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