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“Necessity if the mother of all invention.”
So the age-old saying goes.
The necessity of her sleepy little brother in the back seat wearing a seat belt in her mother’s car prompted McKenzie Demkosky, age 9, to become an award-winning inventress.
During the past school year as a third-grader at Mayfield Elementary School, McKenzie entered the Arrow Book Club’s “Brilliant Ridiculous Invention Contest,” an won a $1,000 U.S. Savings Bond. Her invention was one of the top ten out of 4,000 entries from school students throughout the country.
Here’s how the proverbial ‘light bulb’ switched on over McKenzie’s head when the idea for her invention came to her:
“When my mom and I were driving home one day,” McKenzie explains, “my brother Cameron fell asleep in the back seat. We decided to make a ‘seat belt pet.’ It’s a pillow that goes on the seat belt.”
To illustration her invention, McKenzie drew some pictures to send with her entry. The “seat belt pet” consists of a soft, stuffed toy animal that slips over the seat belt, positioned so that a child’s sleeping head will rest on it so that it serves as a cushy pillow.
“It was difficult to decide the winners,” stated Betsy Howie of Scholastic Book Clubs in a letter to McKenzie. “The judges worked long and hard, and in the end they decided your entry was among the very best!”
McKenzie had to sign a waver giving up her rights to the invention in case a company decides to produce it.
McKenzie will enter the fourth-grade this fall at Mayfield, and Cameron will start kindergarten.
“We are very proud of McKenzie,” said her third-grade teacher Mrs. Melanie Lonzinski, who helped McKenzie submit her invention to the contest.
“Necessity if the mother of all invention.”
So the age-old saying goes.
The necessity of her sleepy little brother in the back seat wearing a seat belt in her mother’s car prompted McKenzie Demkosky, age 9, to become an award-winning inventress.
During the past school year as a third-grader at Mayfield Elementary School, McKenzie entered the Arrow Book Club’s “Brilliant Ridiculous Invention Contest,” an won a $1,000 U.S. Savings Bond. Her invention was one of the top ten out of 4,000 entries from school students throughout the country.
Here’s how the proverbial ‘light bulb’ switched on over McKenzie’s head when the idea for her invention came to her:
“When my mom and I were driving home one day,” McKenzie explains, “my brother Cameron fell asleep in the back seat. We decided to make a ‘seat belt pet.’ It’s a pillow that goes on the seat belt.”
To illustration her invention, McKenzie drew some pictures to send with her entry. The “seat belt pet” consists of a soft, stuffed toy animal that slips over the seat belt, positioned so that a child’s sleeping head will rest on it so that it serves as a cushy pillow.
“It was difficult to decide the winners,” stated Betsy Howie of Scholastic Book Clubs in a letter to McKenzie. “The judges worked long and hard, and in the end they decided your entry was among the very best!”
McKenzie had to sign a waver giving up her rights to the invention in case a company decides to produce it.
McKenzie will enter the fourth-grade this fall at Mayfield, and Cameron will start kindergarten.
“We are very proud of McKenzie,” said her third-grade teacher Mrs. Melanie Lonzinski, who helped McKenzie submit her invention to the contest.
