Smashing success
Eggs take a beating in Caltech’s annual YESS program
By Carl Kozlowski 07/08/2010
Caltech maintained its longstanding tradition of making science exciting when its annual Young Engineering and Science Scholars [YESS] program ended June 30 with high school students from around the nation competing in a catapult-construction competition. Twenty-nine students were divided across six teams in the intense yet fun contest in which young scholars hurled raw eggs across a 100-foot-long tarp in an attempt to determine which catapult could most accurately shoot the farthest.
The team known as The Catapult Formerly Known as “The Prius” — due to the hybrid nature of the handmade contraption — launched their egg 144 feet, easily besting the previous YESS program record by 24 feet. While none of the team members were from the Pasadena area, local students were part of two other leading teams in the event.
Joel Dominguez, a 17-year-old from Pasadena High School, was on the other winning team of the day: the Cataclysmic Catuchet team, which won the accuracy competition by landing an egg just 7 inches away from the center of the frying pan target. Meanwhile, Julian Chaidez, a 17-year-old South Pasadena resident who attends Polytechnic High in Pasadena, was part of the Transformers team, which came in second in both categories with a 136-foot launch in the distance category and landing an egg 15 inches from the frying pan.
“YESS is an intensive three-week summer program that strives to reach out to underrepresented high-school students,” said Caltech Senior Media Relations Representative Deborah Williams-Hedges. “The program is highly competitive and selected 29 students from a pool of more than 1,500 applicants. Being part of it is unrelated to the future admissions process, but it is considered a major advantage if the students choose to eventually apply.”
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