According to a May 30 press release issued by Prairie View A&M, the school’s Drone Competition Team placed fourth in the 2025 Raytheon Autonomous Vehicle Challenge, which is a national competition that top engineering students from across the country participate in.
In this particular challenge, which took place on April 11, student teams were asked to build and operate self-driving drones which could identify and communicate a landing zone to an autonomous vehicle which was supposed to deliver a package into the designated zone.
Prairie View’s team made it to the finals of the challenge, where they competed against nine other colleges, with a team composed solely of first time participants in the challenge.
“This accomplishment reflects the caliber of our students, the strength of our academic programs, and the value of hands-on, experiential learning,” Dr. Pamela Obiomon, who is the dean of the Roy G. Perry College of Engineering, said in the press release. “Their success is a win for all of PVAMU and a shining example of our mission in action.”
The students, team lead Jacob Range, a senior in the mechanical engineering program; Khoa Tran, a junior in the electrical engineering program; Fawaz Abdulwahab, a junior in the computer engineering program; London Williams, a junior in the mechanical engineering program; Jyeshuah Swain, a freshman in the computer engineering program; David Falekulo, a freshman in the computer science program; and Isaiah Maxwell, a sophomore in the mechanical engineering program; all worked for months preparing for the competition, which has a military application, which is appropriate, given Raytheon’s status as a military contractor with the Department of Defense.
In the challenge, the students were tasked with delivering aid to injured soldiers on a battlefield and had to design drones capable of surveying a 30×30 area, locating a visual marker which indicated the landing zone, and communicating those coordinates to a separate ground vehicle for delivery of the package.
“We spent countless late nights troubleshooting and refining every detail,” Tran said in the press release. “It paid off in the end — we’re proud of what we accomplished and excited for what’s to come.”
According to Jonathan Tamplin, a senior principal systems engineer at Raytheon, who assisted the student team as a mentor throughout the semester, “There were moments when things didn’t look promising, but the team pushed through. Their incredible perseverance and determination shone through.”
Although the students are aware of Raytheon’s dealings with the military, some of them, like Range, would like this technology to be used for other applications, like disaster relief efforts.
“I learned so much about project management and team coordination,” Range said in the press release. “I am also excited about the possibility of this technology being used in the future to expand outside of just military use but also being used during events such as natural disasters to be able to deliver aid to those that would not be able to be reached otherwise.”
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