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New Oxford High School's hard work pays offJul 18, 2012 (The Evening Sun - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- There were bolts to be tightened, parts to be put into place and a book of instructions to be followed step by step. Over the whir of a spinning fan that wafted around the scent of sawdust and oil, the sound of students working once again filled New Oxford High School's woodshop. Boxes were ripped open, tools and parts were spread across tables, and two glossy black SawStop table saws were slowly coming together, piece by piece. Though they half-heartedly griped about the effort, there was a sense of excitement among a group of students working through a summer night. Because these new saws weren't bought with money in the school budget. They were won through the efforts of the students and their woodshop teachers in a national video and Facebook contest sponsored by SawStop. SawStop, an Oregon-based company, produces table saws that the company says make a work or school woodshop environment safer. Using a small electrical signal, the blade can stop dead within milliseconds of contacting human skin, which has saved fingers and greater injury, company spokesman Matt Howard said. While the New Oxford woodshop has never had a serious injury from saw, woodshop teacher A.J. Warner said it's always a concern. New Oxford was already planning to replace an old saw this year when Warner got word in April of SawStop's contest to win an industrial table saw and a smaller contractor saw. To enter the contest, a school had to submit a short video explaining why they needed a SawStop saw. Then they had to gather Facebook votes supporting their video. The winner would be judged on the vote total and whether their video was in line with SawStop's goal of promoting safety. A lively bunch of students eagerly agreed to star in the production, Warner said with a smile as the noise of those students filtered through the school hallways on Monday's evening of saw construction, pizza and celebration. And the teacher also recruited the help of graduating seniors Tommy Dondero and Zach Gouker in filming and editing the video. The video is a spin-off of the old television show "New Yankee Workshop," a woodworking guide that aired on PBS. With Warner portraying the mild-mannered, flannel-clad host, Norm Abram, and the show's music playing softly in the background, the school's video takes viewers into The New Oxford Workshop. "Funding for The New Oxford Workshop is provided by the state and federal government and by taxpayers like you," one of the narrators says, playing off of PBS' funding explanation. The school's workshop is a place where students make everything from coffee tables and nightstands to bedroom sets and kitchen cabinetry, the kids say in the video. But because their older table saw can't detect human contact, the woodshop teachers have to stand by students as they operate the machine, to make sure it's being used correctly. With 160 students in the woodshop each year, it cuts into instruction time, the video narrators said. It was the video's emphasis on safety and the use of a woodworking show as inspiration that caught the attention of the contest judges, Howard said when the kids and Warner contacted him for a Skype chat Monday night to say thanks. "We were really pleased with the level of creativity," he said. "It was also the quality of the video and the message." And, even after entering the contest later in the game, the video garnered the most Facebook votes, coming in at 1,500 votes total, Howard said. That's about 350 more than the second-place video, he added. Warner said the push for votes came after the school's May Day celebration, when the woodshop students' work was put on display. Their video was played during the high-school and middle-school talent shows and students were allowed to go on Facebook during the school day and vote for their school. "It snowballed from there," Warner said. "Within a week and a half, we were in first place. By two weeks, we were over 1,000 votes." And when they were declared the winner, the kids who had a role in the video were thrilled, Warner said. Even graduates who starred in the video wanted to come back to school to put the saw together and celebrate the accomplishment. David Scott, a recent graduate, is one of those students. "I came back just to see it, see how nice it is," he said, watching the larger table saw come together. And like the rest of the male students, he wanted to test it out, just to see if it's as safe as they say it is. But as Howard told the group, it's like a car's airbag -- you don't want to find out if it works. So the group contented itself with the slow work of fitting together pieces, of wrenching and hammering and figuring out how to make the machine look just like the one on the instructional book. "We won a contest -- isn't that enough?" joked junior Bret Lawrence as he laid on the hard ground piece together the smaller saw. But Warner knows all the effort on Monday, and all the time spent on the video and voting, will be appreciated when school starts again and there are two new saws in the woodshop. "I think they'll enjoy it and realize what we can do if we try our hardest," he said. "And that's what they did." Press play below to watch New Oxford High School's winning video on YouTube. ___ (c)2012 The Evening Sun (Hanover, Pa.) 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