Fugett Middle School Students Create Award-Winning Manufacturing Video
Jeff Conner, Zach Agamalian, Indiana Bickering, Elizabeth Carr, Liam Aylsworth, Principal Llewllyn Smalls
The efforts of a small group of Fugett Middle School students to learn more about the world of manufacturing were rewarded after earning the prestigious Viewer's Choice Award in the third annual What's So Cool About Manufacturing? student video contest.
8th-graders Zach Agamalian, Liam Aylsworth, Indiana Bickering, and Elizabeth Carr received the award at a ceremony at Penn State's Great Valley campus in March. The group, under the guidance of Fugett Technology Education teacher Jeff Conner, worked together to create a video that highlights the Exton-based USSC group. USSC designs and engineers world-class seating for various types of vehicles, including commercial and military.
The Fugett team competed against students from 13 other middle schools from Chester and Delaware Counties. The contest gives students the opportunity to connect directly with local manufacturers and document their experiences. It is designed to spark student interest in manufacturing careers.
Video submissions are entirely student driven. They are in charge of everything from filming to interviewing to post-production.
According to Conner, the winning team has had multiple technology education classes at Fugett and showed a lot of initiative.
"Zach, Liam, Indiana, and Elizabeth were selected for the competition based on a project they did in 7th-grade where they had to plan, film, and edit a public service announcement," said Conner.
The planning process for the video began last October when the group had to develop an outline for their video, which included the creation of a central message and what impact they wanted to make. From there, they moved to the pre-production phase which included developing a vision for their film and interview questions.
Camera equipment, editing software, and professional guidance were provided to each student team. The Fugett team spent an entire day in November filming at USSC, and by the end of January, the video was edited and ready for submission to the contest.
Once the videos were submitted, voting was opened up to the public. In addition to the coveted Viewer's Choice award, trophies were awarded for outstanding creativity, editing, manufacturing message, marketing plan, and videography.
What's So Cool About Manufacturing? is presented by the Manufacturing Alliance of Chester and Delaware Counties, an initiative of the Chester County Economic Development Council and Delaware County Community College.
