Coleman Middle seventh-graders heard from a senior at Savannah College of Art and Design who presented her “Plan Bee” drone.

Anna Haldewang introduced a personal robotic bee controlled by a smart device designed to mimic how bees pollinate flowers and crops. Similar to how bees transfer pollen from one flower to another, the drone sucks in pollen from a plant and expels it onto other flowers to enable cross-pollination.

Haldewang is an industrial design major and first developed the idea for Plan Bee in a product design class after a professor challenged her to create a self-sustainable object that stimulates the growth of plants.

Coleman seventh-grade students are in the midst of trying to solve the following question in project-based learning period: As a biologist or environmental engineer, what can we do to mitigate bee population decline and inform our community of its impact?

“We are so fortunate to have Ms. Haldewang speak to our students and show them the prototype she designed to solve this real-world problem,” teacher Sheila Harmony said.