Background: Our senior students at School have one day a week completing DPE (Design Production Education) also known as Technology at some schools which is typically one day a week. At Auroa School we have supplied this to our senior students for nearly ten years now. As part of the rotations our students have a laser cutter option. This project based learning takes six weeks - although some students can complete the project in a slightly earlier time frame. The six weeks when the work is being completed the students are able to focus on the project from 9am to 1pm in the afternoon.
Once this has been located and the parts that form the base of the chest have been cut out the next step is to glue the chest together using a specific wood glue. The box was left to dry overnight.
The next step is to work and construct the hinges. The hinges at the rear of the box (see photo), the latch at the front of the chest while they are spray painted silver are also laser cut.
The wood is 5mm Bamboo MDF mix. It is also possible to complete this process using different thickness of MDF and also different type of MDF. The design was completed using Sketch Up. The handles of the chest are also completed in a similar way. 
There are two layers of storage trays inside the chest. The first layer, shown left in the photo contains three storage sections. It has been lined on the inside with yellow felt. The felt was sized up again using Sketch Up, and then cut on the laser cutter. Yellow was chosen to complement the colour of the wood.
The wood glue used to construct the box was also used to place the lining and hold it in the correct place. Holes were placed at the end of the draws and the holes had a insert to allow them to be lifted up.
The inside of the lid of the box was also lined with the same fabric felt.
The bottom layer of storage can be seen here. With the first drawer removed the second storage consists of a draw divided into two long rectangles (for storage or pencils as shown). The draw has been again lined with the same yellow felt that has been used for the other parts of the box. The tray has been glued to the bottom of the box to hold it in place.
The internal hinges were purchased from a local hardware store.
Level of Difficulty: Extreme. This was a project that took a Y8 student who was twelve years old several weeks to complete. It had a number of elements that needed to be completed to an extremely high level. This design was not for the faint hearted and required skill, patience and detailing to make it complete. This was a long term project for the student.
Size: 220mm long 130mm wide and 190mm high. The storage inside reflects the dimensions of the inside of the box.
Timeframe: The laser cutting of the individual pieces including of the box, the handles, the sides, the detailing and the felt took approximately an hour to complete. Given the dimensions of the box this is considered a minimum and does not include the time to construct the box, glue it, have the glue dry etc. This was a project that took several weeks (working once a day) to complete, test and be happy with.
What we would do differently/next steps for students: Potentially the student could have 3D printed the handles (which are the part of project which are touched the most) or had a different choice with the felt for the lining however these are minor issues with this major project. There could have been a different selection of wood for the outside
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