Lesly Rojas worked with classmates to create several award-winning inventions designed to help farm workers and people with disabilities. Your work has generated thousands of dollars in prize money for McKay’s engineering programs. This is part of a series by Salem reporters about graduating seniors.
Lesly Rojas, McKay High School Class 2021 (Courtesy photo)
Lesly Rojas had never touched a motherboard when a friend invited her to a tech club meeting in seventh grade.
Rojas was soon building a prosthetic arm.
“It was an amazing experience bringing my invention to life,” she said.
Since then she has been inventing and building.
Upon arriving at McKay High School, Rojas quickly joined the school’s Math Engineering Science Achievement Club.
As a sophomore student, she was part of a team that designed and built a prototype cup adapted to help people with drinking and swallowing difficulties stay hydrated. The team was one of 15 from the United States selected for a $ 10,000 grant from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Lemelson Foundation to develop their design.
The team traveled to MIT in June 2019 to present their work.
“It was a dream come true,” said Rojas recently of the trip.
The pandemic and the move to online school made it difficult for the group to continue working on this project. But Rojas, always on the lookout for new possibilities, has worked on another design competition aimed at helping people around her.
“We knew that McKay was surrounded by lots of agricultural and blueberry fields and that many family members or even the students themselves tend to work there,” she said.
McKay High School sophomore Lesly Rojas explains a circuit board to a younger student at a 2019 science fair held at First Baptist Church in Salem. (Rachel Alexander / Salem reporter)
Rojas led a team of students who interviewed farm workers, local farmers and agricultural experts about the challenges they faced on blueberry farms. Based on their work, the team created two inventions.
One of these is an apron-like attachment for existing trapping systems, which aims to reduce food waste and prevent the fruit from being damaged when picked. Students found that berries are often damaged by contact with surfaces as they pass through a picking machine and incorporated air nozzles into their design to divert berries without squeezing them.
Another is a solar powered or charged cart that drives itself on a rail and saves workers the tedious and time-consuming process of pushing carts across the field to transport berries.
“She took the lead and motivated a team of students who had never worked on a long-term invention project before,” said Katrina Hull, the engineering teacher at McKay.
The nine-person team was a semi-finalist in Samsung’s Solve for Tomorrow competition and won $ 15,000 for McKay’s engineering program in January.
Amid the chaos of returning to personal school, team members were not yet able to prototype their designs. Rojas said she hoped to continue work on the project. Their goal is to develop technologies that help people.
“Both the adaptive cup and the work we have done with the farmers is very inspiring for me to see it come to life,” she said.
Rojas also looked for business programs in high school, serving as president of McKays Future Business Leaders of America Chapter that year, and doing an internship with MAPS Credit Union.
She wants to own her own inventing business one day and wants to understand the financial side of work, not just the technology, she said.
Rojas will be doing a civil engineering intern for the Oregon Department of Transportation this summer before joining Oregon State University’s electrical engineering program in the fall. She said her successes in high school reflect her willingness to take opportunities as they come.
“Say yes to new opportunities. Say yes to these crazy projects. Say yes to doing a project on Zoom during a pandemic, ”she said with a laugh.
Hull said it was clear that as a freshman, Rojas was a bright, curious student when Rojas took Hull’s geometry class in honor of him.
“I’m super excited to see what’s next for you and what’s on the way. Hopefully one day she’ll hire me, ”said Hull.
Contact reporter Rachel Alexander: [email protected] or 503-575-1241.
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