Essay #1:

                  My Proud Moment

                I have one very proud moment in the past year that I would like to tell about and it all started with my engineering class in high school.  In October, waking for the seventeenth year like I normally did, I dressed and drove to my tech school which I was accepted in my junior year.  It was an ordinary day just like any other day I had that year accept my teacher seemed very energized about something and I could not figure out what it was.  For the whole entire day I pondered what it could be but nothing came to mind except he had a new kind of peanut at home and to get there and eat them.  He really loved peanuts!  The end of the day came and I still could not figure out what he was so thrilled about. Once the bell rang everyone was leaving and I was becoming very unpleasant towards my teacher because I was so agitated.  Then he pulled me aside and told me of a project I was to start the following day and his reason for not telling me in class was the project was to be worked on only by me and my friend Ronny. 

                The next day I was very exhausted because I could not sleep with all that was running through my mind.  Since I was so tired I went and got an energy drink at a 7-11 right before I went to school.  I was late that day because of traffic and Ronny was mad because he wanted to start bright and early.  He was quite the cry baby when he didn’t get his way but none the less he was a very smart kid.  After I got there we started on the project, to us it was simple in our head but getting it down on the computer and paper was a different story all together.  The project was to design a machine or way to power schools and buildings electrically with 75% less the cost.  We had an image of what we were going to try to do with it but it would take a lot of time we didn’t have.  So we drew up some blueprints for that day and then the bell rang so we had to stop there.

                The next morning Ronny and I were both on time and ready to get the project done.  By the end of the day Ronny and I had figured out two ways to make it cost less.  We even increased the savings up to 85% less then what it’s original cost was.  The first way included a lot of expensive material with a newly designed circuit breaker and a lot of other things. This first idea was the one that hit 85% savings. The second idea had a 74% savings and it was the cheapest material we could think of to use, and it worked just as good.  That afternoon when Ronny and I went home we both received emails from our teacher.  Our teacher must have looked at our models and was very impressed because he sounded ecstatic in his message.  He wanted us to come to his house right away to discuss the project blueprints that we came up with. 

                The next morning we both went to class and state chairmen for architectural foundations was sitting talking with my teacher.  We both walked in and started on our project again occasionally looking over our shoulder trying to figure out what they were doing.  Finally close to the end of the day while they were still talking we completed the version we had chosen.  We chose the cheaper one because we thought it would be more appealing, especially with today’s economy.

After we presented it in front of our teacher and showed him how much less and how cost effective it would be the chairmen beside him looked as if he was in shock.  I don’t think he thought high school students could pull off something his workers had difficulty with. After he talked with us and our teacher, he took a CD copy of the project back to the architectural foundation and showed it to the other chairmen.  With in a day we were invited to Crystal City in Washington D.C all expenses paid, to receive the award for first place in energy conservation.

                That day was the most happiest day I have ever had so far! I had a great time with my friends, and I had a chance to see a lot of places in Crystal city that influenced me a great deal today.

After we got back from Washington D.C., we had another award ceremony from the state and received another certificate acknowledging that we built it, we came up with it, and it was our ideas to share.  I was very proud of myself that day and it was an awesome experience.  Hopefully in my career, I will experience more opportunities to get recognition for my ideas in making the economy more cost effective.