Four Drakes Creek Middle School students are advancing in a national STEM contest with an idea to engineer security drones and apps aimed at preventing gun violence in schools.

“We want to prevent as many deaths as possible,” eighth-grader Landon Pulliam said.

Landon, seventh-grader Anthony Clauson and eighth-graders Isaak Truelove and Jack Sikes are representing their school in the Samsung Solve for Tomorrow Contest.

Drakes Creek was named one of five Kentucky finalists, for which it will receive a Samsung Tablet and the chance to compete for $2 million in classroom technology.

The contest encourages students to use science, technology, engineering and math to solve community problems.

It’s an opportunity Drakes Creek technology teacher Lisa Cary instantly jumped on.

“It’s been exciting to see them be able to use the knowledge they have in these STEM fields to actually come up with something that’s going to help our community,” Cary said.

The students took about a month to develop their project’s concept, which involves building drones for surveillance and defense during school shootings and developing mobile phone apps to prevent mental illness and gun violence.

So far, their work has involved researching mental illness and what it would take to make their drones a reality.

Landon said the concept for the robots grew out of the design problem of how to safely spy on a school shooter. The students have tossed around the idea of equipping a drone with a paintball gun for delaying or later identifying a shooter trying to escape.

Through their idea, the students have earned their school a spot among 250 state finalists named nationwide.

The next step involves submitting a plan detailing how their project will benefit their community.

Later rounds of the contest offer escalating classroom technology prize packages, with 10 national finalists getting to present their prototype to a panel of judges. It’s all for a shot at being named one of three national winners who will earn $100,000 in Samsung technology and supplies for their school.

The winners will be named in April, according to the contest’s website.

“It’s just unbelievable … the chance to do something like this and actually solve a real-life problem,” Cary said.

– Follow education reporter Aaron Mudd on Twitter @BGDN_edbeat or visit bgdailynews.com.