Hummingbirds can fly in all directions. So it makes sense that the fluttering pollinators are Isaac Dennett’s favorite birds. The Fort Vancouver High School senior finds himself pulled in different directions too.
Like chemical engineering. Or experimenting with fashion. Or his path into journalism.
Isaac, who lives in Vancouver’s Hazel Dell neighborhood, has observed hummingbirds everywhere from the nearby Ridgefield National Wildlife Conservation Area to the faraway forests of Panama. Driving slowly through the Ridgefield sanctuary with his father when he was little, Isaac remembers sticking his head out of the sun roof to get a closer peek at the birds. “Human design can never be able to match the beauty of birds flying.
They’re a biological marvel,” said Isaac. Isaac’s favorite hummingbird is the Anna’s hummingbird, native to his home state of Washington. To him, the Anna’s hummingbird signifies freedom, and shows how fleeting life is.
“If you’re passionate about something, you should just do it because opportunities are not always going to be there,” Isaac said. So, when the chance to get involved in a high school engineering competition came up, of course he was ready to take it. He was inspired by his chemistry teacher Anne Kizerian and is now drawn towards chemical engineering.
He has twice won the Southwest Washington regional competition, and was second in the state, in 2023 at the National Engineering Design Competition through MESA, an organization that spotlights math, engineering, science and achievement. During his sophomore year, Isaac and his team created a dog harness that would light up at a certain light level to keep the dogs safe if they ever run out on the street late at night. For his junior year, the team made an “emotional robot,” with the shortened name, “emoti-bot”.
The six-buttoned robot — imagine a robot Game Boy, like BMO from Adventure Time — was designed to help little kids with developmental disabilities express their emotion. Isaac himself wears his emotions on his sleeve — literally. He can look down at his bracelets and see a collection of memories and the people he loves.
He knows he has unconditional love from the rose quartz bracelet his boyfriend gave him, and his own passion for birds is represented by his feather bracelet. He is reminded of the support from his best friend Cristina with the beaded bracelets she gave him, and his mother who collected pride bracelets for him. And just like his bracelets, journalism has been an outlet for Isaac to express himself.
He testified to the school board about the school district’s massive budget reduction, then interviewed the school district’s superintendent about the issue for a story. “I love having an opinion and seeing if it’s right or wrong,” said Isaac. “Finding out information and sharing it with other people helps humanity be less stupid.
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