Months of preparation earned four Ockley Green K-8 School students first place in a national competition centered on physics and engineering.
At the MESA USA National Engineering Design Competition in Denver, students from six states presented research and demonstrated their trebuchets, a catapult-like device with superior accuracy.
Representing Ockley Green at the national meet were Monseratt Hernandez, Thien Nguyen, Tinh Nguyen and Ryan Writz. They launched a projectile -- a hacky-sack like object filled with about 40 grams of
sand -- before a panel of engineers and scientists June 25-28.
Esther Romero, the team’s advisor and an education assistant for ESL at Ockley Green, says the students overcame obstacles in their quest to the top, including almost no prior knowledge about physics.
“It isn’t part of the middle school curriculum,” says Romero, who has advised Ockley Green’s MESA team for five years.
Students learned a lot in a hurry. Starting last year in September, they began meeting weekly to discuss concepts, watch videos and conduct Internet research. As the competition neared they began meeting every day after school, staying so long some days that custodians had to ask them to leave.
Two volunteers offered help along the way: Romero’s husband and Juan Rodriguez, a retired physics teacher, worked with students to explain the math and science concepts necessary to build a working, accurate trebuchet.
Ockley Green MESA team members prepare their trebuchet at the national meet in June. (Photo by David Coronado)
Teachers and school staff chipped in, too, giving team members flexibility on homework deadlines and helping them manage occasional class absences that resulted from their participation. Students paid nothing to participate, thanks to support from
Oregon MESA,
The Lemelson Foundation and Intel.
Romero says the students faced stiff competition, especially from
California, which has 15,000 students who compete in the MESA events
compared to Oregon’s 400.
“This is a very big accomplishment for them,” says Romero. “They
sacrificed a lot for this, practicing and practicing. This is an
experience they couldn’t imagine.”
Also participating in Denver was Benson High School, which together with Ockley Green represented Oregon at the event. Both teams qualified by competing first at a regional event held in May at Portland State University.
MESA is a pre-college academic program run by Portland State University that engages middle and high school students in hands-on, inquiry-based math, engineering, science and technology projects. Learn more at
www.mesa.pdx.edu.
