Mepham Olympiads Take Home First Place

On March 15, 15 schools from across Long Island participated in the Physics Olympics at SUNY Farmingdale sponsored by the Long Island Physics Teachers Association.

Mepham High School’s Olympiad Team members Nicole Altomare, Corryn Chaimowitz, Connor Garet, Brian Keohane, and Matthew Waldmann captured the First Place trophy. Teams participated in five events:

1. The Kilogrammy event, where students determined the mass of an object, hanging from a series of strings, by measuring the tension and angles of the strings supporting it.
2. The Pendulum of Doom, where students predict the range of a pendulum that is cut by a razor blade at the bottom of its swing based upon its height of release.
3. The Marshmallow Challenge, an engineering design project, where teams use spaghetti, tape and string to create the tallest tower which supports a marshmallow.
4. The Fermi Event, where students estimate size or value of quantities. An example of a Fermi Question would be "How many drops of water are in all of the oceans on earth?"
5. The Physics Bowl, a game show style event testing student's general physics knowledge.