In the News: Times Union visits InvenTeam

The Times Union is the largest newspaper serving the Albany Capital Region. Check out todays edition to see two photos and a great article on the Saratoga Spring HS InvenTeam. We are psyched to have this awesome exposure and hope to see more and more in the near future. Below is the article as it appears in the paper or click this link to read it now.

Nurturing seed of invention:
High school class gets funding to build device to help grow better plants

By DENNIS YUSKO,
Thursday, October 25, 2007

SARATOGA SPRINGS -- Saratoga Springs High School technology teacher Michael Gallagher has experienced it, and he's willing to bet you have, too: that disappointing sensation of buying an expensive plant or flower, bringing it home, then watching it wilt, against your will, before your eyes.
If you could prevent that, you would. Gallagher and 14 seniors in his engineering design and development class hope to one day help you.
They have received a prestigious national grant to invent a prototype device that can be placed in soil to measure essential elements such as sunlight, moisture and soil acidity. The students also will develop a computer software database that users of the device can access for information about what plants are best suited for particular environments.
"The kids are really excited to be involved in this project," Gallagher said. "In the engineering world, this program is as big as it gets."
The high school is one of 16 nationwide this year, and the only one ever in upstate New York, to be awarded the Lemelson-Massachusetts Institute of Technology grant, which will provide up to $10,000 for the development of the intriguing product.
If it and the software work as expected, property owners looking to spruce up their neighborhoods could access the information to discover what kind of plants and flowers are best appropriate for their conditions. Or, perhaps, grow redder, more juicy tomatoes.
"It's a grant to solve a real problem," Gallagher said. "From growing up as a kid, I saw plants die immediately and other ones flourish."
Gallagher submitted the winning application last spring and learned of the award this month. MIT received hundreds of applications for the grant and selected only the most feasible proposals, Gallagher said.
The class will prepare its invention over the next eight months and present it before an audience of thousands in the spring at the InvenTeams Odyssey at MIT in Cambridge, Mass.
"I always get more nervous about this than the kids," Gallagher said.