Tag Archives: engineering

Chávez HS students blast off toward national rocketry competition

The casual observer might never guess that the students who gather after school in Dr. Maqsuda Afroz’s science classroom at César E. Chávez High School are anything but ordinary high schoolers. They gossip and smack-talk and speculate about the future, most of them seniors with one foot out the door. Few would guess that these “average high schoolers” are in fact literal rocket scientists.

The Chávez Rocketry Club, headed by Afroz, spends two afternoons a week (and sometimes lunch periods or whatever scraps of free time they can get) designing and engineering model rockets for an international competition, The American Rocketry Challenge.

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Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee announces $1 million grant for Booker T. Washington HS community science venture

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee visited Booker T. Washington High School on May 6 to announce a grant toward “The Vision” Community Statue Project. The $ 1 million in federal funding grant comes from the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Community Development Fund and will pave the way for the student-developed project’s completion.

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Waltrip HS Engineering Program recognized for high number of certifications

The engineering application company SOLIDWORKS recognized Waltrip High School for having one of the highest number of CSWA certifications in the state.

Representatives from SOLIDWORKS, Lab Resources, and Houston ISD’s Career and Technical Education Department visited the campus and its engineering students on Wednesday.

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New Washington HS set to open for the 2018-2019 school year

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When students enter the new Washington High School this fall, they will be greeted by a prominent image of civil rights activist and educator Booker T. Washington.

This year marks the 125th anniversary for the school, which was built in 1893 as the city’s first African-American high school.

Washington Principal Carlos Phillips said he is excited to move into the new school and looking forward to presenting the facility to the community.

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East Early College HS places second in national SECME competition

East Early College HS Falcon 1 team, Pablo Flores, Miguel Lara, and Alejandro Meza

East Early College HS Falcon 1 team, Pablo Flores, Miguel Lara, and Alejandro Meza

The East Early College High School’s (EECHS) Falcon 1 team, whose members are Pablo Flores, Miguel Lara, and Alejandro Meza, won second place in the High School Water Rocketry category at the 2015 National SECME (Southeastern Consortium for Minorities in Engineering) Competition.

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HISD’s Washington High School Partners with British School to Build a Mission on Mars

Partnership possible thanks to KBR’s support

Students at HISD’s Booker T. Washington High School are collaborating with students at the Ormiston Victory Academy in Norwich, England to build a mission on Mars, thanks to KBR’s Discover Engineering Committee.

The SAMbassadors program is designed to engage students in science and engineering projects with a global perspective.  The students at both campuses Skype every other week to discuss the logistics of this project and share documents online.  Each school has 25-30 students in the program.

One group of students has been determining environmental conditions on Mars such as wind speed, temperature, atmospheric gases, sunlight and shade, radiation and soil conditions. Another group is designing the living conditions.  Meanwhile, the British students at Victory Academy are creating 3D CAD drawings.

The students from both campuses will Skype immediately following the press conference on Monday, May 20, 2013.

What: SAMbassadors, program to a build mission on Mars

Who:  Aimee Yuan, KBR-DEC chairperson; Patrick Harkin, KBR-DEC outreach chair; Jack Kramer, KBR engineer; Dr. Nghia Le, engineering teacher, Washington High School; LaShonda Bilbo-Ervin, principal, Washington High School; Elizabeth Nolazco, student, Washington High School

When:  Monday, May 20, 2013; Press conference – 9:30 a.m.; Skype interview – 10 a.m.

Where: Washington High School, 119 East 39th Street, Houston, 77018

NASCAR Driver Partners with Chavez High School

Members of the Chavez Motor Sports Engineering team stand next to their car March 21, 2013, to be driven by NASCAR racer Donnie Neuenberger in the Texas Mile competition held March 22-24, in Beeville, Texas.

Physics students at Chavez High School are revving up their math and science skills and putting them to the test in a real life application that has the potential to hit speeds of over 180 miles per hour.

Chavez science and engineering teacher Greg Ditch helped create Chavez Motorsports Engineering – an after school program in which students learn what it takes to engineer a competitive race car that will be put to the ultimate test run by a real NASCAR driver.

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Deadline extended for HISD’s RFQ on architectural, engineering services

Architectural and engineering firms seeking to take part in the Houston Independent School District’s $1.89 billion 2012 bond program to replace and modernize schools across the city will have more time to submit their Statement of Qualifications.

HISD officials decided to push back the deadline from Jan. 7 to Jan. 15 at 2 p.m. after more than 300 people turned out Tuesday for a pre-submittal conference on the RFQ to solicit design and engineering services to build or renovate 40 schools.

Attendees asked a variety of questions about the RFQ, including how to present financial information and how to comply with district goals on participation by minority and women-owned business enterprises. In addition, many asked for more time to prepare their submissions. Continue reading →

Clifton MS Student Engineers a Win at Statewide TAME Competition

Victoria Rodriguez

Victoria Rodriguez and four of her peers from across the state engineered a victory at the Texas Alliance for Minorities in Engineering (TAME) Statewide Math & Science Competition recently, using nothing more than four toothpicks, two rubber bands, a clothespin, and a few dozen other small items.

Dubbed “The Tower of Power,” the crane the Clifton Middle School eighth-grader and her teammates constructed with these materials could successfully pivot 90 degrees and lift 83 marbles up to six-and-a-half inches.

“We came up with our design by trying to imagine an actual crane and used the tools we had to make a smaller version,” said Victoria, who acted as her team’s project manager. “Our crane was successful because it did everything it was built to do.”

The team’s accomplishment is even more impressive when you consider that it got a late start. “We only had 10 minutes or so to build it,” she said.

Nevertheless, Victoria’s team took home the prize, and she was one of a dozen HISD students to place at the 27th annual competition, which was held at Texas A&M University on April 14.

Other students who received awards at the event were: Moises Tacam (Challenge ECHS), Desmond Titus (Jordan HS), Samantha Gomez-Mora, and Emmanuel Onochie (both from DeVry Advantage Academy), who closed out the second through fifth-place prizes in the Integrated Physics and Chemistry category; Jessica Salazar (Challenge ECHS), who won fourth place in Physics; Nicolas Xiong (East ECHS) and Jayvian Green (Jordan HS), who won fourth and fifth place, respectively, in Advanced Placement Physics; and four others who also placed with their teams in the design challenge.

The event brought together more than 300 winners in grades 6–12 from 11 regional competitions across Texas. In addition to testing student knowledge of math and science concepts, the competition promotes teamwork, leadership, and academic achievement.