Yes, you read that right. To qualify to go to the TSA (Technology Student Association) state-level competition, one must beat all others schoolwide first to be able to represent our school at TSA State. In 2023, I and my partner participated in the TSA technology problem solving competition. This competition gives participants an engineering problem and limited materials as well as limited time in order to produce a product that solves the problem. The team with the best solution wins. During the early school competition, me and my partner were given the challenge to build a tower using a sheet of paper, a piece of wood, straws, and tape that held a given mass (a piece of aluminum extrusion) the furthest distance off the ground. In this nerve-wracking competition, under the pressure of time, we worked tirelessly and iterated several times in order to produce such a tower. In the end, our tower (left) successfully held the aluminum part (which is seen atop the tower to the right) 18.5 inches high, just a mere quarter inch higher than the second-place tower at 18.25 inches.
Technology Problem Solivng is one of the biggest competitions that TSA has to offer, and every year thousands of people participate. At Georgia TSA state, there were around 50 teams that participated, most of whom had to qualify as the best in their individual schools. This made this competition the most exciting and nerve-wracking competition at TSA state that 2023 had to offer. The image to the left depicts me in official TSA attire, before the competition.
Finally, the day of the competition came. Now, we were given a time limit of 2 hours to build the longest cantilever structure using several straws, several popsicle sticks, two plates, and some paper. A cantilever is a structure that extends a distance unsupported over a ledge, only being supported on one side. However, the rules of the competition allowed competitors to bring their own glue and tape. The rules did however necessitate that the final product may only contain the materials given, and glue as well as masking tape as provided by the competitors. This is where I had a brilliant idea: to use the masking tape rolls themselves as a counterweight to our cantilever. This allows the cantilever to extend farther without tipping over by weighing it down on the supported end. This did indeed fit within the regulations as we removed the cardboard centers to the tape, such that the final product did indeed only include masking tape, glue, and the given materials. The second brilliant Idea I had was to support the cantilever in the middle using tension by creating a sort of rope out of paper strips. This lifted the cantilever, allowing it to extend 5 inches further. All the other materials were then only used to extend outwards, giving us a very long cantilever. The cantilever we made at state competition is shown to the right, which extended 85.5 inches off of the table ledge.
In the end, our cantilever was the longest final product in the competition at the aforementioned 85.5 inches, beating second place by a tremendous margin of 15 inches. This ended up earning us the first place trophy for technology problem solving, shown to the left. Having won such an achievement, we qualified for nationals and will be competing in kentucky between june 28 to july 2, 2023.
Kavin Prakash
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