Rensselaer Adventures

On Saturday Saint Joseph's College hosted one of the regional science olympiads for Indiana. I took a quick look at several of the activities. Below are students competing in the robot arm competition.

I do not remember seeing the mouse-trap car event before. The goal is to see how far you can make a wheeled vehicle go powered only by a mousetrap. The challenge is to release the energy stored in the mousetrap gradually rather than all at once.

The results and more (and better) pictures are available here. Rensselaer Central High School is again competing elsewhere this year. The middle school team was there and did well, making it on to the state level.

While I was there I noticed that a display case was featuring dinosaur bones.

Saint Joseph's College once had a very good geology department, and the people in the department amassed quite a collection of rocks and minerals. I had not previously seen any of their dinosaur holdings.

The display also included information about who collected these fossils and when.