A team of three students from Damonte Ranch High School are now national champions in 3D Animation. The teens are members of a student-based organization called Future Business Leaders of America.
The team gave us a quick look: A little robot glides across the screen, behind him an animation showing a teacher speaking with students. The robot narrate, says, "whether helping a student unlock their potential or making sure they are prepared for life ahead, the impact you have on students is enduring."
The clip is part of a video that won 1st place for Damonte Ranch High School at a national 3D animation contest. "It was a competition for the Future Business Leaders of America or FBLA,” says McKayl Turner, “and we were given a prompt to create a 3D animated video about staff dress code.”
Amee Lombardi, is the Computer Science teacher at Damonte Ranch High School and the students’ advisor. "They really, really have to be able to self-teach, because none of the three were experts in 3D animation, they're self-taught."
You read that right, the team of students, McKayl Turner, Jordan Jacobson and Mike Caron taught themselves 3D animation. But, computer science was nothing new to these students. "When you make 3D animation, you create shapes, two dimensional shapes which end up making 3D animated characters,” explains McKayl, “which is what we did to create our narrator which is Cody. He's a cute little robot that flies around."
The students had to create content for the video and be able to sell the idea. Again, the topic this year was dress codes for teachers. So, they did some research and came to realize..."teachers, once you're to that point, you know how to follow a dress code, you know how to dress professionally, and so it was for us to sell why they should,” says Turner “and showing that interaction between teachers and parents and teachers and students.”
The sales pitch and the catchy animation worked.
After six months of hard work, this weekend, the team nabbed the top prize at a Future Business Leaders of America national competition in Atlanta, Georgia. Lombardi is proud of the students’ accomplishments. "They learn how to work in a team environment, they learn how to make decisions, basically solve problems."
The recent high school grads will be entering college in the fall. All three are majoring in computer science.
