The second annual Engineering Day attracted approximately 140 students from nine school districts. Each team competes to create the best functional ‘Rube Goldberg machine’ using only a set of everyday materials provided for the project. The teams are given approximately three hours to design and assemble a machine in Rube Goldberg fashion, which is to say deliberately over-engineered to perform a simple task in a complicated way through chain reactions. They are given no advance knowledge of the materials to be used in the competition.
This hands-on project requires students to use not only their academic skills, such as science and math, but also interpersonal skills such as time management and teamwork. The competition included two divisions, one for middle-schoolers, the other for high school students. The top three teams from each division receive medals as well as bragging rights among the competing schools.
The event is a collaboration between BT-BOCES and the Eastern Southern Tier STEM Hub, with assistance from SUNY Broome. View gallery
The results of the competition are as follows:
High School Division
1st - Seton Catholic Central
2nd - Chenango Valley
3rd - Seton Catholic Central
Middle School Division
1st - Chenango Valley
2nd - Whitney Point
3rd - Susquehanna Valley