TELLING OUR STORY
2021 FOUNDER’S AWARD WINNER SONORA MIDDLE SCHOOL
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veryone has a story and the students of EAST at Sonora Middle School are no different! This year they shared their story with their peers, community, district leadership, and ultimately the EAST network and found themselves to be one of the recipients of the 2021 EAST Conference Founder’s award.
MEET THE SMS EAST TEAM Guadalupe Granados: 3 years in EAST, 7th Grade Zane Turner : 2 years in EAST, 7th Grade Katelyn Spurlock: 6 years in EAST, 7th Grade Colee Ratchford: 5 years in EAST, 7th Grade Dixie Stevens: 2 years in EAST, 7th Grade Corbin Sandy: 6 years in EAST, 7th Grade Meredith Villanueva: 3 years in EAST, 6th Grade Sala Jongewaard: 3 years in EAST, 6th Grade Natalie Robles: 4 years in EAST, 7th Grade Emily Parks: 4 years in EAST, 6th Grade Laura Capacho: 2 years in EAST, 7th Grade Liah Tovar: 2 years in EAST, 7th Grade
Founder’s is a self-nominated award. Who or what planted the seed that you all should nominate yourself? Mr. Ratchford: It is just our mindset that we will apply for Founder’s every year even if we are not eligible or don’t think we have done as much as we could have. It really helps them see our whole program, evaluate what classmates have been working on and come together as a conference team to prepare for the EAST conference. It forces us to get organized and to practice telling our story. Guadalupe: This year especially, Mr. Ratchford pushed us to meet deadlines and encouraged us to be better every day. No one says that we are doing this to win Founder’s. We just did it to tell our story.
Which project highlighted in the nomination and presentation was... ...The favorite project of the group?
Zane: “Fish or Friends” was easily our favorite but probably our most difficult too. Katelyn: We are using an underwater drone to try and locate an endangered species of fish. It’s always fun to try new
things and get outside to learn, but it isn’t just about the underwater drone. Colee: We are also using ArcGIS to map and look at buffer zones around the rock quarry. We are building seismic sensors with an Arduino to measure impact on their habitat from the dynamite blasts mainly because the fish we are locating use vibrations in the water to see.
...The most impactful project for the group? Dixie and Corbin: Braylon’s Capri 1000. In this one, we think it had more of an impact on our group than it did our client. Braylon is such an inspirational kid to talk to. He motivated us to learn things and do things and reach out to others more than we have in the past. We learned so much working for him and with him. He made a huge difference in how we will do EAST in the future.
...The most impactful project for the community? Meredith and Sala: We made an effort this year to make sure all of our projects positively impacted the community.
