A team from Newtown High School earned a top award from this year’s EdAdvance Skills21 Expo Fest, as announced on June 5.

In a recent e-mail about the achievement, NHS computer science teacher Krisin Violette said she is proud of the students and their accomplishment.

This year the NHS team earned first place in the Skills21 Expo Fest Computer Science category for an innovation they named, “Recall.” The team also earned a Best Overall distinction, according to Ms Violette.

Last year’s team earned the What If Computer Science Challenge first place trophy, and the previous year an NHS team earned the A Closer Look Computer Science Challenge first place trophy from the event.

According to its website, skills21.org/expofest, the “Expo Fest is a competition held annually in Connecticut in which high school students work in teams to design, develop, and implement an innovative product or solution to a given challenge.”

NHS students Juan Mendez, Anthony Crisci, Jackson Baimel, and Sam Staubly participated on this year’s team. The team competed with the name Byte Sized Cookies and created a project they named “Recall.” A description for the submitted Recall entry reads, “To assist people affected by memory-deficiency, we present to you AI-smart glasses called Recall... Whether it be forgetting when to take medication or misplacing your car keys, Recall can be relied on to help. With Recall, auditory and visual reminders will be there to bolster your memory. Recall’s built-in microphone, along with its AI, searches for important information in your daily conversations, using it to set up later reminders. Recall implements this stored information in these reminders.

“Recall’s auditory reminders include automatic time-sensitive or non time-sensitive notifications Recall reads out, both if prompted and automatically,” the description continues. “Visually, Recall’s app stores reminders for later viewing, organized by topic to keep you on top of important material. Recall’s intuitive design and app makes it easy to use for everyone. In addition, Recall uses facial recognition technology, marking your important contacts, as well as specialized location tracking, to provide additional crucial information that the wearer can easily ‘recall’ back to. In conclusion, Recall’s auditory and visual reminders, facial recognition technology, and specialized location tracking provide a perfect solution for those suffering from memory-deficiency.”

Juan, a sophomore, said in a recent e-mail that the effort was a team project.

“My particular involvement was being the primary writer or scribe for the project, essentially responsible for making sure all elements of our project were accurately depicted and articulated in words,” Juan wrote. “As the other members, I also contributed through providing ideas and helping develop our culminating idea for the project. In truth, everyone assisted in a bit of everything; we never had strict roles, more general responsibilities, which I believe ultimately made the project better.”

Juan also said working with the NHS team was the best part of the experience, along with making the project come to fruition. Working on Recall throughout the year made the group work together “like a machine,” he observed. He also thanked “Ms Violette for providing this opportunity and guiding us along the way, being generous with her time.”

Anthony, also a sophomore at NHS, said in an e-mail that his main involvement in the project was as the primary editor, 3D modeler, animator, and web designer.

“While working on Recall the best experience was being able to work and develop a solution to a problem the entire team cared deeply about,” Anthony said. “We all invested not only our minds but also our hearts into the project which made working on it and completing it truly amazing.”

Along with meeting new people, Anthony said working on the Recall project has increased his teamwork and time management skills.

Jackson, a freshman at NHS, managed social media and created an app for Recall.

“I really enjoyed working with the rest of Byte Sized Cookies to try and make Recall the best it can be in the midst of the pandemic, as that definitely made things a lot trickier,” said Jackson in a recent e-mail.

Despite the pandemic, Jackson said he learned the NHS team was capable of powering through the project.

Sam, a fellow freshman at NHS, said in a recent e-mail that he brainstormed, designed, built, programmed, and tested the Recall prototype on a computer. Sam said he enjoyed seeing the project come together.

“This project [helped] me understand what I want to do in the future,” Sam shared. “It is a great example of a company atmosphere with our group working together to do the design, research, and marketing... I have learned how it feels to design, build, and program a prototype inside of a bigger project with the pressure of deadlines and other issues surrounding me, preparing me for the future. It shows me that being an engineer in a company is something I would enjoy doing.”