Henley High engineering students build custom ride for 4-year-old who loves dinosaurs 

July 24, 2025 / Henley High School engineering students have joined forces with a national initiative to design and build a custom ride-on vehicle for a young boy—blending hands-on engineering experience with a mission of inclusion and play.

The project is part of the national Go Baby Go initiative, which fosters mobility through the adaptive design of ride-on cars for children. Henley students customized a bright red car for Paxton, a 4-year-old from the Eugene area who loves dinosaurs.

“Mobility is directly tied to social development in children,” said Dr. Kristi Lebkowsky, Henley’s engineering teacher and project advisor. “When kids can’t move freely, it limits their ability to play, engage, and grow socially.”

Lebkowsky learned about Go Baby Go at a conference last year and introduced the opportunity to her engineering students. They were given a base car kit and designed modifications based on Paxton’s specific needs—including head and neck supports, a push-button toggle control, and an adjustable harness system. Two senior students, Joshua Weaver and Anthony Flores, led the first phase of the project. They applied their mechanical and electrical engineering knowledge to develop a custom head support system and personalized the car with Paxton’s name and dinosaur decals.

“We took the skills we learned in class and applied them,” Flores said. “We know he likes dinosaurs, so we made the car just for him.”

After graduating, Weaver and Flores handed the project off to a second team: Layne Worrell, Theron Tyler, Aliea Bresch, Ethan Bissell, and Alex Smith. When Paxton’s initial fitting revealed the car wasn’t quite right, the second team revised the car to better accommodate him. Using the original notes and design plans, they redesigned the headrest for adjustability, improved the harness system for growth, and used 3D printing to create custom parts. They also added armrests and a sensor-controlled toggle system for easier operation.

“We built on what the first team started and improved it,” Tyler said. Worrell added, “We wanted to make it as perfect as we could for him.”

Paxton received the car in July, and he loved it.

“This kind of project is a great real-world engineering experience,” Lebkowsky said. “Just like in industry, teams shift, designs evolve, and solutions are built collaboratively.” Lebkowsky plans to incorporate Go Baby Go into the curriculum each year, offering students hands-on experience in biomedical, mechanical, and electrical engineering. She also hopes to establish a local chapter of Go Baby Go in southern Oregon.

“This is a way to give back to our community and serve children in Klamath County,” she said. “With these cars, kids like Paxton aren’t just moving — they’re playing and being included.”

Go Baby Go is a national, community-based research, design, and outreach program that provides modified ride-on cars to children with limited mobility. For more information, visit GoBabyGo.org.