Gulfport High School students bring prosthetic legs to Peruvians

Robotics students at Gulfport High School have been working diligently for more than a year for an opportunity of a lifetime.

Four Gulfport High School students had a life-changing experience in Peru as they fit over 30 people with prosthetic legs that they had the opportunity to help create.

Before they could fly to Peru, dozens of prosthetic parts needed to be 3-D printed, which takes 27 hours per piece.

Then, the crew meticulously cleaned and packaged the parts, a task they were proud to do. “You really had to look past the, you know, tedium of it, and look more into where it was going to go and how it’s going to be used,” said Grayson Huffman, senior mechanical lead for Gulfport Robotics.

Once in Peru, the students worked with two other schools to fully assemble the prosthetics and then fit them to amputees.

Students could interview amputees and learn their stories.

“My biggest takeaway is that we really take what we have for granted,” said Cedric Walker, who is part of the mechanical impact team. “We don’t understand how good we have it. Even on our worst days, we have it better than some people.”

These students could finally see the fruits of their labor as people took their first steps in years.

“Really, very different than when you were just thinking about it,” Huffman said. “Actually doing it, actually making their lives change for the better is… not just life-changing for them, but life-changing for us.”

The Gulfport robotics team would like to thank Harbor Freight Tools for School, who helped get these students to Peru, as well as Brian Cole and Chickasaw High School, who originally created this program.