In fall of 2022, we caught up with Brian Copes, a winner of the 2021 Harbor Freight Tools for Schools Prize for Teaching Excellence®. As a manufacturing teacher in Chickasaw, AL, Copes’ mission is to equip his students with both the drive and skills to create products to improve the lives of others. Over the past academic year, he took this mission to a new level by inviting seven skilled trades teachers from across the country to collaborate on his key manufacturing project: 3D printed prosthetic legs for amputees in Central America.
Copes connected with many of the teachers involved through the network made up of his fellow prizewinners, as well as other teachers at prizewinners’ schools:
- 2018 prizewinner Matt Erbach in Streamwood, IL, and his students used machining to produce 100 of the ‘leg bone’ components for the prosthetics.
- 2017 prizewinner Jonathan Schwartz in Colfax, CA, and his students crafted sleeves for rubber bushings, which are key for the stability of the ‘joint’ parts. They’re also working on repurposing ski boots for the socket portion of the leg.
- 2019 prizewinner Cesar Gutierrez in Tucson, AZ, and his students 3D printed 40 ankle and lower knee joints to contribute.
- Martin Baryhill in Enumclaw, WA, has specialty equipment in his classroom to print a unique rubber insert for increased stability.
- 2017 prizewinner Dave Huffman in Gulfport, MS, has worked with his students to manufacture a variety of the parts needed for each prosthetic.
- 2021 prizewinner Staci Sievert in Seymour, WI, and her students have crafted wooden toys to share with children in Central America receiving prosthetic legs.
- 2021 prizewinner Stephen Lindridge in Candor, NY, and his students made 200 pivot pins for the knee and ankle joints of the prosthetics.
Lindridge even coordinated a trip with seven of his students down to Alabama to deliver their pivot pins in person. Copes shared that the visit, where his students walked Lindridge’s students through the assembly process of the prosthetics, reaffirmed that this project shows kids how they can change the world. Lindridge called it a ‘trip of a lifetime,’ and hopes to visit again in the future as the collaboration continues.
Upcoming trips for Copes and his students to deliver the prosthetics include Peru in August, and Nicaragua in October.