School's Competition 2017

SCHOOLS COMPETITION WORKSHOP - The Bridge

Future St Helier - Connect, Green and Recycle St Helier as part of our consideration for the future of the Island and St Helier in particular, we are inviting school pupils to take part in a fun, hands on competition, to experience the excitement of Design, Architecture and Engineering in the construction of a new model bridge.

Introduction

For the JA 2017 School Teams Competition: Pupils are being asked to construct a model bridge from a selection of recyclable products found locally, able to achieve specific pre-determined performance requirements. This will involve two parts:

Part One - Schools Project In-house Learning
Part Two - Competition Day Workshop on Friday 22nd September 2017

Duration - 2Hrs 15.00 to 17.30
10 minutes assembly
10 minutes Introductions, Safety and Design Brief
60 minutes Workshop, Team Design and Fabrication
20 minutes Judging
10 minutes the ultimate test - how many chocolate bars can it hold? 10 minute Awards and Summary
Winners Presentation

Design Brief

A ‘Bridge’, a connector, a route, a road, a path, a journey, an experience, a viewing point, or an entrance. A bridge can be all these things and more!

Teams of school pupils are asked to construct a model bridge that can span a 1 metre clear gap between two raised blocks.

Bridges will be judged on aesthetics, and originality of design, and ingenuity and be tested for the ultimate load carrying capacity - the question on everyone’s mind - How much weight/how many Chocolate Bars can it hold?

Teams will consist of 1 - 6 pupils.

Teams will have the opportunity to prepare and test out ideas before the day, but construction of the model bridge will be only take place in the workshop on the day of the competition.

Specifications

The span under the bridge must be clear. The minimum unsupported clear span must be 1000mm long for secondary school students and 500mm long for primary school students.
The maximum unsupported clear span cannot exceed 1200mm/700mm

The maximum length of the entire bridge must not exceed 1300mm/800mm relative to spans as noted above
The maximum height of the bridge from its base must not exceed 500mm The maximum width of the bridge must not exceed 100mm.

The load will be applied centrally on the bridge deck, so don’t forget to leave a clear space for the chocolate bars.

Materials

In the spirit of recycling and reuse of materials, this competition aims to reuse typical household products that are generally thrown away.

Please ask the teams to collect and save the following to test ideas, and to then bring along to the competition workshop.

Two copies of the JEP newspaper
Two large cereal cardboard boxes (please do not bring boxes that may have contained nuts)
Two 1 litre milk cartons (washed)
Four kitchen roll tubes
Two egg cartons (six egg type)
Ten plastic drink straws (to be provided at the workshop)
Four metres of string ( to be provided at the workshop)
One roll of masking tape (No glues allowed!)

Categories

The competition will be split into two categories, one for Primary and one for Secondary School Pupils

Category A Primary Schools

Category B Secondary Schools

All age groups will utilise the same materials for the design of their model bridges.

Judging Committee

Judged by a group of four.
President of the Jersey Association of Architects Representative of the Jersey Structural Engineers Representative of the Jersey Architecture Committee Special Guest connected with the Arts and Education

Assisting Participants

Education Staff/Teams respective teachers

Construction professionals will be on hand to assist the workshop teams with the task providing advice.

Architects
Engineers
Construction Professionals

Judging Criteria

10 points - Appearance of Design
10 points - Structural Performance / Design Efficiency 10 points - Understanding of Design Requirements 10 points - Collaborative Approach and Teamwork

Bridges come in all sorts of sizes, shapes, forms and function, be imaginative, be creative, enjoy recycling and most of all enjoy and have fun.

Prizes

Presentation of a BIG Cheque to the winning Schools Book tokens to the individual students

Category A Primary Schools Total £500.00 Category B Secondary Schools Total £500.00

Special additional AJA prize to the Model Bridge that holds the most Chocolate Bars -

The Bridge that wins this gets the Chocolate!