The build/design-themed events on Friday, which are free and open to the public, will be held from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Brazos County Expo Complex in Bryan. Saturday’s laboratory and knowledge-based competitions, only for participants, will be held on the Texas A&M campus. All events will conclude with a Saturday evening awards ceremony at 6:30 p.m. in Texas A&M’s Rudder Auditorium.
In one of the events, called “Towers,” a competitor watches as a judge measures her balsa wood tower. Students in this event compete to design and build the lightest and tallest towers that can withstand the heaviest load. This is part of the Texas Science Olympiad, a rigorous academic contest that is part of a broader national competition aiming to improve science education in schools. It covers a variety of science, engineering, and technology topics and tests students’ knowledge through problem-solving and teamwork.
Each competing school is allowed one team of 15 students in either Division B (grades 6-9) or Division C (grades 9-12). Throughout the two-day competition, students will showcase their skills by constructing gliders, towers, cars, launching rockets, detecting diseases, and discerning potions and poisons. With nearly 200 Texas A&M and Blinn College faculty, staff, and students, along with local coordinators, setting up and judging the 56 events, the competition promises to be challenging and exciting. Organizers and judges from NASA, as well as business and industrial representatives from Houston and Austin communities, are volunteering their services and expertise as well.