Sturgis Brown High School students are participating in the annual Buffalo Chip Student Build Challenge. The students are getting a lesson in creativity, exposure to the industrial arts - and helping local charities.
Organizers say the Student Build Challenge is a group project where a new Harley Davidson motorcycle is stripped down, cut in half, and rebuilt using donated motorcycle parts.
The rebuilt, state-of-the-art motorcycle is then auctioned off at the rally - proceeds go to local charities.
Keith Terry from Terry Components in Spearfish helped the students during the reconstruction. He says the Student Build Challenge gives students skills they can use later in life.
“We don’t really think that these kids are going to go out and end up in the motorcycle industry – that’s not what it’s about. It’s about having the confidence to leave school and go out and accomplish something on their own. They have the confidence that they can do it. So we’re showing them that you don’t have to be inside the box, you can go outside a little bit, and create your own thing, and that’s what we like to do – it’s customizing things instead of being just like everybody else,” says Terry.
In the past two years, the motorcycles built by Sturgis high-school students have taken top honors at the Black Hill Motorcycle Show and at the Donnie Smith bike show in St. Paul, Minnesota – they’ve also been featured in a six-page spread in American Iron magazine.
This year’s motorcycle sold for more than $51,000. Organizers say they will split the money between the Black Hills Special Olympics and the Sturgis Motorcycle Museum and Hall of Fame.
