The Hays High Industrial Tech Association has ended their competitive year as undefeated. The group, just coming back from state, is the first team to remain undefeated throughout the whole school year.

“We won all our races this in a standard class,” Dinkel said. “I cannot say that somebody didn’t win all of their fall competitions or somebody didn’t win all of their spring, but to my knowledge, no other school has won all of their fall and spring races.”

HHITA is a student-led organization directed towards the use of technology and serves as a collaborative space for students. One of the team’s main goals is Kansas Electrorally where the team designs and builds a one-passenger vehicle powered by two lead acid batteries.

“We compete around the state in a one hour timed race,” Dinkel said. “We compete with schools anywhere from 1A to 6A; there’s no classification of school size.”

The students are allowed space for creativity and experimentation when it comes to projects. Dinkel said he doesn’t like to hold a tight reign over students and wants them to figure out new uses of technology.

“Our main goal is to promote technology within the educational environment formant,” Dinkel said. “With that being the case, students are able to come in and work on different projects.”

The group meets every Tuesday from 7-9 p.m. yo work on their individual and group projects. Dinkel said they’ve been meetin since September, and that most of the time, they to go to races blind on whether or not their car actually works.

“I think it’s important to understand that we don’t have anywhere to test our cars,” Dinkel said. “We have a pretest in the hallway where we do a set of inspections and that’s it. When we hit the road and we’re on those tracks, it’s the first time they’re really testing it out.”

Dinkel said that even with the obstacles they had to overcome, the strength  of the team persevered.

“It really shows their persistence and attention to detail,” Dinkel said. “When we get to the race there are so many things that could go wrong and do go wrong, there’s things you can’t control. So it’s important remember that our team is getting it right the first time.”

The team use their own tools and often come to work in their free time.

“The way those kids come together and work together is unbelievable,” Dinkel said. “Our kids use their resources to their advantage.

18agonzalez@usd489.com