Upward Bound Event

Recently Iron Range Engineering hosted an upward bound event with some local high school students. At this event we started by asking the students what interested them about engineering. Of the 25 students, only 4 of them had any interest in engineering and 2 more didn't know enough to make a decision; so we had our work cut out for us. The day started out with an introduction to what engineering is and the different types of engineering to show the students that engineering is all around them. After the students got a background of engineering we explained what we do at Iron Range Engineering and how the program is unique compared to other schools. The students toured the facility and were fascinated by some of the different experiments that had been built and also the different projects that each team was working on. To get the students introduced to the different forces a bridge undergoes a quick explanation of Newton's laws, stress, and strain were demonstrated. To make the bridges, a tutorial of AutoCad inventor software was explained so they could start designing their bridges. Although they had a few difficulties, the students were beginning to be creative and have fun. After lunch the students got to test their bridges to see how much weight they could hold. This was very impressive; one group was even able to hold a full 5 gallon bucket of sand with 13 more pounds of hand weights on top. At the end of the day the students showed more interest; about half now were interested in engineering. Events like these are a great exposure to engineering concepts and a great motivation for IRE students to see that their efforts are affecting lives of these students.

Carissa Butterfield and Mike Carlson