CWU Hosts Technology Student Association Conference

ELLENSBURG, Wash. - Nearly 200 middle- and high-school students from 23 Washington schools have assembled at Central Washington University for the annual Technology Student Association (TSA) state conference. It's the first time CWU has hosted the event, through the Industrial and Engineering Technology (IET) department.

TSA is a non-profit national student organization that promotes science and technology education, including through hosting competitions across the country at the regional, state and national levels.

"One of the goals of IET is to increase participation in the engineering sciences," says Dr. William Bender, IET chair. "We also want to expose these students to our engineering- and technology-education courses."

Scott Calahan, CWU industrial and technology education professor and event coordinator, points out, "Many of our former students are now teachers who have brought their students to campus. Current Central IET students are also holding demonstrations at our hydrogen fuel cell and in the foundry so these student can see what else is going on here."

The participating students advanced to the state competition after winning at the regional level. Through tomorrow (MARCH 25), they will be applying their technical knowledge in about 50 different thought-provoking competitions against their peers, including in computer-aided design, structural engineering, filmmaking, photography, Web site design and robotics. Those projects can be performed individually or in a group.

Awards will be made to the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishers.

"The winners here qualify to go on to the national level," says Ross Short, the Washington state TSA director, a drafting and design teacher at Stanwood High School. The 28th annual National TSA Conference will be held June 21-25 in Dallas.

More than 200,000 high school, middle and elementary students at 2,000 schools in 47 states participate in TSA, which was formerly known as the American Industrial Arts Student Association. Founded in 1967, the name was changed to the Technology Student Association in 1988.

Contact: Robert Lowery (509-963-1487/fax 509-963-2301/e-mail: loweryr@cwu.edu)

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