Building a brighter tomorrow
The senior team consisted of Kevin Fitzgerald, Maya Sheth, Julia Kumar, Priscilla Wu, Christopher Seger, Raquel Levitt, Joshua Pelberg, and Elijah Zawatsky. With two years experience under their belt, the seniors approached the competition with a more relaxed demeanor. Fitzgerald said, “We didn’t expect to do nearly as well as we did.”
The annual Technology Student Association Tests of Engineering Aptitude, Mathematics and Science Competition at calls together a swathe of the most passionate prospective engineers from around the Cincinnati area. On March 2, two teams of engineers left SHS early in the morning to travel down to University of Cincinnati and participate in this competition.
Senior Joshua Pelberg said, “There were two participating teams, one made up of seniors and one made up of sophomores. The Seniors competed in the 11/12 category, Division 9, while the sophomores competed in the 9/10 category.”
The senior team included Pelberg, Maya Sheth, Julia Kumar, Priscilla Wu, Christopher Seger, Raquel Levitt, Kevin FItzgerald, and Elijah Zawatsky. The sophomore team was made up of Jenna Bao, Jodie Lawson, Harsimran Makkad, Max Snyder, Yvanna Reyes, Matthew Swartz, Matthew Isakson, and David Godar. Physics teacher Ms. Julie Haverkos helped pick both teams and chaperoned the trip.
Sheth said, “The senior team went into this year’s competition considerably more relaxed than in the previous two years. Our level-headed approach paid off, as we won second overall and a $5,000 scholarship to UC Engineering.”
The competition consisted of a 90 minute, 80 question multiple choice test , with ten questions pulled from each of eight categories. following this test, the teams assigned members to either the essay writing team, who wrote three essays on three of the eight topics, and a building team.
Seger said, “This was the first year they added a building portion to the competition. We had three 15 minute periods to plan, prototype, and construct a paper tower. We had to try and add as much height as possible using as little paper and time as possible.”
The second place finish guarantees that the senior team’s score will move on to the state and national round.
Levitt said, “The regional score considers only of the multiple choice test, while the state and national scores take into consideration the essays and building portion. It’ll be exciting to see how we did.”
