Athens, Ga. – Student teams from two Gwinnett County Schools-Mountain View High School and Duluth Adventist Christian School-won first places in the High School and Middle School categories in the 2013 Tests of Engineering, Aptitude, Mathematics and Science competition recently hosted by the University of Georgia.
Under the coaching of Billy Jones, Mountain View High won first place in their division while two Lithonia schools-Arabia Mountain High School won second place and Miller Grove High School won third place. Two teams-Tucker High School of Stone Mountain and the Fernbank Science Center in DeKalb County-participated in the second part of the competition.
Duluth Adventist Christian School, coached by Jana Taylor, clinched first place in the Middle School category while Lithonia Middle School placed second and Freedom Middle School of Canton placed third. Tucker Middle School and Henderson Middle School of Jackson also participated in the competition.
In the past, the TEAMS competition featured only high school students (grades 9-12) participating in teams of four to eight members, using real-world applications of mathematics and science to solve some of the most current engineering challenges.
This year, for the first time, the TEAMS competition was opened to middle school level students as well. This year’s challenge focused on, “Engineering a Secure Cyberspace.” There were two parts: with high school students facing a 90-minute, 80 multiple choice question session and a 90-minute, open-ended, four-question session, while the middle school students had a 60-minute, 40 multiple choice question session, and a 60-minute open-ended, four-question session.
Yolanda Curtis, of Northrop Grumman awarded the 2013 Northrop Grumman Scholarship to Mountain View High School. The scholarship provides funds for team registration to the event.
Participating middle school students were treated with an hour-long robot demonstration at UGA’s Tate Center by Chi Thai, a professor in UGA’s College of Engineering, and one of the TEAMS organizers. Participants also heard several speakers during the day, including Tim Foutz, academic director of the College of Engineering; Charles Kutal, associate dean of the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences; and Wanda Stitt-Gohdes, associate head of the College of Education’s department of career and information studies.
The fourth TEAMS annual event was held on Feb. 20 and organized by Thai, John Mativo, an assistant professor in the department of career and information studies and Nancy Vandergrift, program coordinator in UGA’s Office of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education. They were assisted by Mickey Montevideo, public relations coordinator for the college of engineering; Xue Xing, Jixian Wen and William Tyler, all graduate students in workforce education.
More than 14,000 students across the country participate annually in TEAMS competitions. Questions are aligned with national education standards. UGA is one of two sites hosting the competition in Georgia. The other site was Georgia Tech.
TEAMS competition site sponsors include Northrop Grumman, the UGA Office of STEM Education and the College of Education’s department of career and informational studies.
For more information see, http://teams.tsaweb.org/teams/index.html, www.coe.uga.edu/ and www.northropgrumman.com/.