“i i on the pi pi” [“eyes” on the pi’s”] won first place in Somerville Math Funds Scrapheap Showdown.

On October 28, 27 high school students on 9 teams gathered in “The Cage” in Cousens Gym at Tufts University to compete in the Somerville Mathematics Fund’s 13th annual Scrapheap Showdown. Instead of just the usual interesting “junk” in the center of the room when the students walked in, there were also piles of foam core. The students were given their challenge: to design and build a catapult on a base of homasote board. The teams worked intensely, designing, building, testing, reinforcing, and adjusting their catapults.

Time was called after three hours. Now was the time for the three competitions. The first challenge was to fling a marble contained in a balloon the farthest distance. Each team had three tries and their longest trial was counted. The second challenge was “bowling” — throwing for accuracy as many marbles (in balloons) as possible in two minutes at empty water bottles lined up on a table. This proved the most difficult challenge of the afternoon. The third challenge was the craziest. All the teams were at their own table in a circle around a kid’s swimming pool with a bucket in it. Each team had 10 ping-pong balls. They all shot towards the pool at the same time. Lots of ping-pong balls bouncing all over. There were points for landing in the pool, with a bonus for landing in the bucket.

Teams were ranked in each event, one thru nine, with 1 getting 1 point, etc. So the winning team had the lowest final score.

The team with the lowest overall score, was “i i on the pi pi” [“eyes” on the pi’s”] (Brian Jian Chan, Luca Duclos-Orsello, Timothy Labounko). The second place team was the “Crimson Quackateers” (Owen Chiu, Daniel Correa, Stephen Freitas). The third place team was the “Euleroids” (Kevin Arbaiza, Iskandar Nazhar, Myles Rivera). There was a tie for fourth place between “Buoys” (Samuel Newman, Tayara Romero, Henry Zou) and “Honeybees” (Jackson Anderson, Tristan Brown-Vazquez, Max Nadeau).

“Crimson Quackateers” won second place.

The teams could choose their prize in the order they finished. The prizes donated were: three $100 gift cards (donated by Anne Button), four 2019 Red Sox tickets (donated by Sam Voolich), three $50 RedBones BBQ gift cards, 3 $75 AMC gift cards (donated by Chase Duclos-Orcello) and a combination of Science Museum passes (6 to the Omni Theater, 2 4-D Theater, 2 Butterfly Garden, 2 Planetarium and 4 Exhibit Halls) donated by Maggie Rabidou. All competitors and volunteers went home with Scrapheap Showdown teeshirts donated by Gerald and Debra Bickoff of Commercial Cleaning Service.

This event was for both fundraising and an intellectual challenge – all funds raised go towards a Somerville Mathematics Fund scholarship for an outstanding Somerville mathematics student. The winning fundraiser was Nikhilesh Rattan who took home a RedBones BBQ gift card.

To see many more photos from the event, including all of the teams, go to our blog post https://somervillemathematics.blogspot.com/2018/10/scrapheap-showdown-catapult-fest-fall.html

Designers and refiners of the challenge were: Sanford Bogage, Anne Button, Chase Duclos-Orsello, Zachary Faubion, Adam Foster, Monica Fernandes, Richard Graf, Jay Landers, Zbigniew Nitecki, Erica Voolich, and Michael Voolich. Stanhope Framers donated the foam core; and Somerville Home Depot, the homasote. Michael Morgan and Patricia Murphy-Sheehy, teachers at Somerville High School, recruited student teams. Michael Voolich designed the T-shirts with the icon use donated by Icons8.com [add active link on blog post, the website https://icons8.com/ and Yongkang Yu designed the poster advertising the event at the high school.

Sponsors of the event included Math Department at Somerville High School, Winter Hill Bank, RedBones BBQ, Commercial Cleaning Service, Century Bank, Jay Landers and Jasper Lawson, Anne Button, Zbigniew Nitecki and our most wonderful host, Tufts University. Suffolk University Catering provided the refreshments for the teams and volunteers. Various members of the Board worked on all aspects of organizing the event and worked to make it a success along with community volunteers Clarissa Westney and Ben Perrin.

The Somerville Mathematics Fund was chartered in 2000 to celebrate and encourage mathematics achievement in Somerville. In January, they will be looking for teacher grant applications; and in April, they will be looking for scholarship applications. For more information or to volunteer or to make a donation, call 617-666-0666, e-mail mathfund@gmail.com, or go to www.somervillemathematicsfund.org.

“Euleroids” won third place.

“Buoys” tied for fourth place.

“Honeybees” tied for fourth place.

Nikhilesh Rattan was the top fundraiser.