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Oakland Technical High School
Design challenges give the girls at Oakland Tech a chance to brainstorm, design, and learn about teamwork. The girls began this year designing catapults. Girls were divided into pairs with seniors working with freshman while sophomores worked with juniors. This helped girls make new friends. Each pair of girls worked on their own catapult using the engineering design process to improve on their original design. In the end the girls tested their catapults' accuracy and strength in the Oakland Tech Catapult Olympics.
The Techbridge girls took what they learned building catapults and applied it to the Diet Coke and Mentos Challenge. This explosive and engaging engineering design activity took the girls' imagination to the next level. The girls had to design a tool that would drop a certain amount of Mentos into a two-liter Diet Coke bottle without the girls getting wet. The girls came up with a variety of different tools and each one worked well. Some geysers were larger than others but the design challenge gave all the girls a chance to experiment and learn in a supportive and fun environment.
