The first day of school is less than a week out, and Lauren Shen, it could be said, already has the angles down.
Most of them, anyway. The 16-year-old incoming junior at Morgantown High still isn’t exactly sure what she’ll be doing down the road in college.
“I know it will have something to do with math or engineering,” she said Tuesday.
Now she can add surveying to the parcel of possibilities.
Surveying is that practice of mapping and spatial locating that can be used to make sense out of everything from the management of suburban blocks of land for commercial development — to today’s mathematical-minded sleuthing by law enforcement, in cold cases.
And Lauren is now No. 1 in the nation, among high school students considering the possibilities of surveying as a career.
She took first place in the 2022 Richard E. Lomax National Trig-Star competition, which was hosted by the National Society of Professional Surveyors over the spring and summer.
Two students from Texas and California came in at second and third places, respectively.
Tuesday, everyone from the Morgantown quadrant vectored in at Triad Engineering, a firm on Chaplin Road that helped sponsor the state competition over the spring, with the help of Morgantown High.
With her math teacher Brian Jackson looking on, Shen received a $2,000 check from Tim Burch, the executive director of the national society, which keeps its borders in Frederick, Md.
“I’m very happy to be handing this over,” Burch said.
“Bright students like Lauren are the future of our industry.”
It’s an industry that goes back a bit, said Kevin Brockett, Triad’s surveying manager.
“There were property disputes in ancient Babylon that needed a surveyor to get resolved,” he said.
Along with computer mapping and the latest 21st advancements, you’ll still see surveyors out there, using a lot of the same techniques employed by George Washington — yes, that George Washington — who just might be America’s best-known surveyor.
Chances are, you’ve seen more than you can count, in your time.
You know who they are, even if you aren’t exactly sure what they’re doing, with that tripod and viewing device (slightly futuristic) that they’re squinting through.
Using math and science, they’re taking fixed points, mapping the terrestrial points or three-dimensional points between them, using angles and distance.
While the practice is cerebral and mathematical, it isn’t always ivory-tower lofty.
It might be a matter of making sure the boundaries of your house match up with what’s on file at the courthouse.
That’s important, if, say, you’re building a new addition or putting in a swimming pool — as you’ll need to know, exactly and precisely, where your property line is, in relation to your neighbor’s.
“I do like that human element of it,” she said.
It’s not all numbers for the student, though.
She plays violin in the MHS orchestra and enjoys spending time with her little brother, Mason, and her little dog, Milo.
And, like most in her generation, she unwinds with video games — but only to a point, said her mother Yuxin Liu, a WVU professor of computer science and electrical engineering.
You can thank both the gene pool and a popular computer mapping game for that, her mom said, with a laugh.
“Lauren did our whole house in 3-D,” she said.
“With Minecraft.”
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