FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MEDIA ADVISORY – Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Fargo Public School District #1
415 N 4th St, Fargo ND 58102
Submitted by Lisa Farnham, Marketing & Communications Assistant
Email: [email protected] Phone: 701.446.1011
STUDENTS LAUNCH PUMPKINS FOR PHYSICS LESSON
Smashing pumpkins this time of year is usually an act of vandalism. Not so for this group of students!
WHAT:
WHEN:
WHERE:
CONTACT:
Pumpkin Launching
Wednesday, October 19, 2016; beginning at 9:40, 10:31, and 11:21 a.m., and 1:20 p.m.;
The largest group of machines will be tested from 1:20 to 2:05 p.m.
Field south of Staff Parking Lot, Davies High School, 7150 South 25th Street, Fargo
Shawn Carney, Davies Physics instructor, 701.446.5703 or [email protected]
for more information.
More than 70 students at Davies High School will get a green light to smash pumpkins on October 19 as part of
their Physics class assignment. Students in Physics and Advanced Physics science classes have designed and
built trebuchets, slingshots, and catapults out of wood, metal, and other materials to launch pumpkins for
their lesson on projectile motion. The students will launch 8-10 pound pumpkins from their hand-crafted
machines and then measure distances and launch times to determine velocity and projection angles.
Classroom groups will test their pumpkin launchers at the times listed above. Bragging rights for best launcher
will go to the group that designed the machine that launches their pumpkin the furthest. Last year’s longest
distance for a launched pumpkin was 67.5 meters using a trebuchet, which shattered the competition’s first
year longest result of 26 meters.
This is the third year of the pumpkin launching activity at Davies under the guidance of instructor Shawn
Carney.
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