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Sixth Grader Builds Computer, Presents to Classmates

1/3/2017

Collegiate School 6th Grader Drew Atiyeh remembers the exact date he finished building his first computer: Oct. 22, 2016. The process took a couple of months and when it was finished, he showed his parents.

“It was really exciting,” he said. “They thought it was really cool. I think my dad was kind of jealous.”

Flashback a year. Fifth Grader Drew signed up for a robotics activity with Daniel Bartels, Middle and Upper School STEAM coordinator. Mr. Bartels showed him videos of FIRST Robotics and Drew decided to help the Upper School robotics team members with their computers. He became adept at using various software, including Inventor. At home, his parents used Macintosh computers and Drew needed a PC to run the software he liked to use. So, this year, he decided to build his own machine.

“I thought it might be a good learning experience,” he said. “And it would also be fun.”

Mr. Bartels enlisted current 12th Grader Quinn Schebell to help Drew. Like Drew, Quinn enjoys building computers and has put together more than a dozen of his own.

“I like seeing that there are younger students already showing such deep interest in technology,” Quinn said. “I was around his age when I built my first computer and it can be a very influential experience, since it can either be incredibly difficult or trivially easy, depending on who you work with and what directions you follow.”

With the computer finished, Drew approached Middle School technology teacher, Dan Bell, and asked if he could speak to 5th and 6th Grade classes about the building process during Computer Science Week in December.

"I was astounded at his bravery for volunteering to publicly share his knowledge and at his mature understanding of the fact that the best way to learn is to teach," Mr. Bell said.

Drew plans to continue working with the robotics team and has begun thinking about his next computer, a dual GPU with a 1080 video card and i7 core with 6,700 GHz.

“It’s going to be extremely powerful,” he said.

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