Future Leaders Winner Shares Love Of Engineering
LAFAYETTE, Colo. (CBS4) – Every month during the school year, CBS4, along with its partners at the Colorado School of Mines & PDC Energy, honor a high school student who is excelling in science, technology, engineering or math. Our Future Leaders award comes with $1,000 and a profile on CBS4. January's winner is Cassidy Cheesman, a senior engineering student at Centaurus High School in Lafayette.
Cheesman is currently working on her Capstone Project.
"It's called SplitFix, colon, The Organization of Bifurcation," Cheesman explained.
It's an App, that will help children stay organized between multiple homes.
"My parents divorced when I was in middle school, and it was pretty rough on me," Cheesman told CBS4.
She says that for children of divorce, living between two homes can be very disruptive.
"I would forget my Chromebook charger, so the App has something that reminds kids on the days that they're going from one house to the other, to bring their Chromebook charger," Cheesman said.
When she couldn't find an existing organization system that worked for her, she decided to use her coding skills to design her own. Cheesman plans to continue working on the App in college, and hopes to bring it to market in a couple of years.
Cheesman is also all about inclusion. She and her friends formed a club called Galgorithms. They made a video to promote STEM among their peers.
"We found we all just really have a passion for engineering, and we had no one else to share it with," she explained.
Galgorithms organized and held an engineering camp for girls in third through fifth grades.
"Just seeing them, with such talent. That's also one of the reasons the Galgorithms came together is to nurture that talent on through high school," Cheesman said.
LINK: Nominate a Future Leaders Candidate
Cheesman nurtures younger STEM students at Sanchez Elementary School.
"You work with a lot of young kids, why are you so passionate about that?" asked CBS4 Meteorologist Lauren Whitney.
"I get so excited about stuff that I want to pass it along to people, because I just think it's so cool," Cheesman replied.
Cheesman plans to continue nurturing her own love of engineering, and spreading that love to everyone around her.
