Middle School Masters of Science and Technology

Their task was to build a mousetrap car, but their car kept breaking.

Yet middle school students Anjelica Vartuli, Jocelyn Gladwin and Alyssa Barcomb kept working on it every chance they got, trying new ideas as they went, and it paid off Thursday night at the STEM competition when they won for the fastest car.

"We never thought we’d win," said Jocelyn.

"But we kept learning from our mistakes," said Anjelica.

"We worked really well together," added Alyssa.

And that was the point of the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) program, said the East Haven educators who brought the new curriculum to the school system.

Assistant School Supt. Erica Forti said school officials wrote a grant proposal last year and received a $140,000 state technology grant. The money enabled East Haven to equip classrooms with the latest education technology and revolutionize its science and technology curriculum.

The STEM competition is the result of the new project-based, hands-on learning approach. Teachers divided students into small teams and gave them projects to work on, culminating in the finals on Thursday at East Haven High School.

Eighth graders built mousetrap cars, driven by simple levers and pulleys. A lever is attached to the mousetrap bar at one end and to a string at the other. The other end of the string wraps around the axle of the car. Springing the mousetrap pulls the lever, which pulls the strong, which turns the axle, and that moves the wheels of the car.

Seventh graders built Mars Rover Egg Drop projects. NASA’s Mars Rovers descend to the planet’s surface on parachutes, but land on cushions. The students must design a similar system for "landing" a chicken egg on a target platform without breaking the egg. The lightest-weight successful project wins.

Sixth graders built Quake and Shake Survivalist House projects. Their Popsicle stick houses must withstand a simulated earthquake, created by shaking a wood platform with the blade of a reciprocating saw.

The students must work together to come up with a project solution that is better than the solutions of the other teams.

But what happens when your solution doesn’t work?

Jocelyn, Angelica and Alyssa said their first design used regular size CD discs for wheels, but that wasn’t fast enough. So they tried bottle caps, and that didn’t work. Finally they settled on mini CDs, and they worked okay.

But trial and error also taught them to stretch rubber bands around the edges like tires. Otherwise, the edges of the CDs didn’t produce enough friction and would just spin on the floor without moving the car.

The girls also tried different lengths for the balsa wood car body, which kept breaking, and changed the width of the axles several times before finding one that didn’t jam. By the time they were through, the lever was the only part that remained from their original car.

The girls thanked their science teacher, Jan Staires, who encouraged them to keep trying again and again.

"They won because they kept fixing it and changing it," said Staires. They finally perfected their car on the last day before the competition. If it worked from the start, the girls’ car probably wouldn’t have won, Staires said.

The judges for the mousetrap car competition were Dr. Ali Golbazi, an electrical engineering professor at the University of New Haven, and two recent East Haven High School graduates who are studying engineering at UConn, Elliot Schneer and Kaitlyn Bellucci.

"It’s good to see the younger kids getting involved," said Schneer, who noted they didn’t have this when he was in high school.

"I think it’s a wonderful program to get the kids started on problem-based learning," Golbazi said.

He said it is difficult to get students’ attention in the 21st Century, because they learn and think differently than older generations. But with project-based learning, teachers can get the students involved on a project and teach them the math behind the technology later.

Team Nerd, the whimsical name for the trio of Connor Brown, Chris Affinito and Aleksander Zbikowski, explained that is what they did while working on their car, which took first place in the computer-aided design category.

Aleksander said they learned thicker axles and smaller wheels give the cars more distance and thinner axles and bigger wheels give the cars more distance. "It’s the wheel and axle theory that we learned in science," he said.

8th Grade 1st Place Winners

CAD SketchUP (computer-aided design) category: Connor Brown, Chris Affinito and Aleksander Zbikowski.

Distance category: Connor Brown, Chris Affinito and Aleksander Zbikowski.

Speed category: Alyssa Barcomb, Jocelyn Gladwin and Anjelica Vartuli

Creativity category: Tori Carlson, Corinne Palmer and Alicia Vitigliano

7th Grade 1st Place Winners

Accuracy category: Caterina Esposito, Marissa Taylor and Bryanna Thomas

Creativity category: Jesse Krasnow, Philip Magliulo and Michael Riveccio

CAD SketchUp (computer-aided design) category: Celeste Martindale, Melanie Pagano and Shannon Wynne

6th Grade 1st Place Winners

Quake and Shake Survival category: Olivia Petroccio, Liliana Ramirez and Kiana Rosa

CAD SketchUp (computer-aided design) category: Daniel Davis, Brandon DePalma and Lauren D’Onofrio