At the annual Center for Initiatives in Jewish Education (CIJE) Innovation Day, engineering students from Jewish schools all over the tri-state area will present projects that they have designed and executed over the course of a semester as a culmination of their year’s learning. Though the event will be held virtually this year, Mr. Michael Spindel’s freshman and sophomore Engineering students have approached their presentations with creativity and professionalism. Freshmen Aviva Kessock and Tiferet Tuchman designed a “Kavanah Klock” that lights up and sounds an alarm to remind people to daven at appropriate times. This project required them to use a breadboard to build the physical clock and to write the code in Arduino to allow it to function. Freshmen Tani Fish and Lois Rifkin built a “20/20 Vision Project” to address the currently pervasive problem of eyestrain caused by long periods of computer usage. The “20/20/20 Rule,” which states that, for every 20 minutes spent looking at a computer, one should look 20 feet away for 20 seconds, is a useful principle to prevent extreme eyestrain. However, it is difficult for most of us to implement this rule in practice. Tani and Lois built a device that automatically cuts power to a computer monitor for 20 seconds after 20 minutes of use. We are grateful to have such innovative problem solvers in our midst!
