Students on the Beyer High School robotics team wanted to make a difference, and an Iraq War veteran from Stockton is grateful for their efforts.

The Modesto, California students recently presented Jose Jauregui with a prosthetic hand they designed from scratch with the goal of helping the veteran to play softball again. Jauregui lost his left hand during an explosion in Iraq in 2005, and a doctor familiar with the robotics team’s work connected him with the students, KCRA reports.

The team wanted to design a hand that was strong enough to catch a ball and lean enough to fit inside a baseball glove, but their first 3-D printed hand didn’t quite fit the bill. With their second iteration, Jauregui managed to play catch with students in April.

“Going into it we didn’t know much, it was hard to figure everything out, which is why we had to go through a second attempt, making sure that the numbers were right,” junior Mark Wright told CBS Sacramento.

Students are still working to finalize their design, but Jauregui said he’s looking forward to doing a lot of things he couldn’t before. “I think, it would be amazing, this is just the beginning really,” he said. “It’s advancing so fast.”

“I think it’s really cool that they’re involved in stuff like this. It looks hard to do and really time consuming,” Jauregui told KCRA. “I appreciate that they’re doing this for me. Hopefully, we get a lot of use out of this.”

Moral development researcher Jeffrey Guhin suggests that sometimes there is a tension between self-actualization and compassion. Jeffrey Guhin, writing in The Content of Their Character, concludes, “Compassion only makes sense to the degree that it is a means to self-actualizing.” Here the concrete nature of assisting Jose Jauregui with a hand clearly connected the dots.

Freshman Danielle Haubrich said she’s already learned a valuable lesson.

“It’s almost indescribable being able to see that you’re making a change,” she said, “not only for someone, but also to change the community in the process.”

Haubrich told Fox 40 she hopes the project will inspire others “to overcome these limitations by using science, technology, engineering, 3D printing, to make themselves these prosthetics.”

Jauregui and the robotics team aren’t the only ones who recognize the potential.

The project also received honors at the Idaho Regional FIRST Robotics Competition in April, according to the news site.

Teachers and principals working to strengthen moral and citizenship formation in their students can find information and strategies at the UK’s The Jubilee Centre. In The Jubilee Centre’s own words, the following illustrates how they view their work.  “The Jubilee Centre is a pioneering interdisciplinary research centre on character, virtues and values in the interest of human flourishing.  The Centre is a leading informant on policy and practice through its extensive range of projects contributes to a renewal of character virtues in both individuals and societies.