Three teams of high school students from Southern California prepared Friday to head to Texas to compete in an annual solar-powered car race with cars they designed and built.
For the Solar Car Challenge, a 4-days race taking place at Texas Motor Speedway, students at Temple City High School were testing their solar-powered vehicles that they built from scratch.
“We were able to fully test our solar panel through this great amount of sunshine we’ve had recently,” said Brandon Lu, a participant in the race. “We will fully see what the solar panel can output to the battery.”
Unlike Southern California, Texas may not have abundant amounts of sunshine, so the students said they prepared for the worst case scenario.
“We can expect that it might be cloudy when we go to Texas, so our voltage will be a little lower,” added Isa Wu, another student in the team.
The teams predicted that even with cloudy skies in Texas, they would still be able to “fully power” their solar panels, allowing their race cars to travel 17 miles per hour.
The students have been immersed in workshop preparations for this year’s race since last September, though it can take them up to three years to see their ideas come to fruition.
“You don’t learn this in your regular normal classroom,” Rylan Chau, a participant from Temple City High School said. “It allows students to work with different fields, such as mechanical work, welding, and also includes business.”
Silvia Wang, another highschool senior, mentioned that the challenge might also help with her future career.
“We have a lot of STEM-oriented clubs on campus, not many are as hands-on as this,” she said. “I hope to use this knowledge gained from all our wonderful advisors to hopefully build a foundation to a future in engineering.”
According to the program, students who participate in the Solar Car Challenge have a 23% greater chance of going into a STEM career than students participating in other STEM programs.
“This is the top project-based STEM program in the country,” Dr. Lehman Marks, the founder of the Solar Car Challenge said.
The program was established in 1993 to help motivate students in science and engineering.
The Challenge teaches high school students how to build roadworthy solar cars, aiming to increase awareness of sustainability.
This year, the 31st annual Solar Car Challenge is a closed-track event at the Texas Motor Speedway involving 32 teams from 12 states.
This is the brain sport,” Marks said. “It’s not just about building the car, but how to drive that car, solve the inevitable problems that happen with the car, and keeping your team intact through four grueling days of racing.”