The wooden arm released from its hold just after the judge gave the signal to launch. The team members held their breaths as they watched the bean bag shoot from the masterpiece they worked so hard to create.

Our Spark Engineering teams traveled to Texas A&M University December 1 to compete in the Catapult Pre-Built Competition at the 2018 Spark Conference. Many teams from different school compete in this event, and there were many competitions as well.

“We had two teams going to the competition,” Spark sponsor and technology teacher Misty Rhoden said. “Each team is building a standalone catapult that will launch bean bags.”

The catapults were judged based off of their distance, accuracy, and overall design. They are required to be made entirely by the students and needed to be three feet tall, three feet long, and three feet wide.

“The competitions are developed through partnerships with Texas A&M engineering societies and featured a variety of engineering design challenges,” co spark leaders Olivia Moss and Sydnie Maguire said.

The two teams that went to the competition were Inferno and Catapult Crusaders, and each consisted of six members. The members in Team Inferno were freshmen Nathan Dunlap, Julian Jefferson, Jeremy Kilkenny, Preston Patrick, Makayla Van, and Carl Markham. They had been gathering together at the courthouse square and building their catapults at Dunlap’s house.

“We hadn’t gotten the chance to build together a lot, but we made the plans for the catapult a while ago and it all seemed alright,” Markham said.

At the competition, Inferno got second place with their catapult, and Catapult Crusaders did not place. However, for the Society Competition six people placed in three teams. The first place team was juniors Cristal Reyes and Sarah McHenry and senior Suhani Patel; the second place team was sophomore Robby Walia and seniors Jack Ezell and Samantha Roberson. The third place team was Dunlap, Jefferson, and Markham. The Society Competition teams were given materials and an equation to solve, and they compared their results with the other teams.

“Both of our teams’ catapults worked and the students had a lot of fun and also gained some valuable experience,” Rhoden said. “I am very impressed and proud of the hard work that both teams put into this competition.”