Last week Cathedral High School Physics students participated in an Engineering and Design Competition hosted by St. John’s University.

Students chose to enter the Catapult competition, where they had to design a catapult out of toothpicks, casein glue and dental floss. The catapults had to have a launching box to launch a steel ball 1.6 cm in diameter.

Olivia Macho, junior, took first place with her catapult, launching the ball 67 cm. Jevan Wilfahrt and Zack Paszkiewicz took second.

After the initial competition, St. John’s gave students the opportunity to compete in an Impromptu project, where they were given a bag of random materials, some of which included popsicle sticks, a round plastic ring from the inside of a roll of scotch tape, a piece of string, a long piece of scotch tape. Students had to construct a tower at least 4″ tall to support a downward force (provided by a pneumatic press on site). The winner was determined by the ratio of the downward force to the mass of their structure. They had 45 minutes to complete their structure.

Olivia Macho took first place in the Impromptu division and Mason Wilmes and Logan Kreilkamp took second. St. John’s physics department hosts this annual competition for high school students. Students were also shown many of the physics department projects such as lasers, gamma rays, levitating objects using sound waves, 3D printer projects, and lab experiments.