The Hawthorne High School courtyard was transformed into a roller coaster exhibit for students, staff, and visiting family members on June 9 by pre-calculus students under the supervision of math teachers Cheryl Pasquale and Ryan McMann. The roller coaster project has become an annual tradition at the high school, requiring teams of students to implement math and physics skills as they showcase their creative abilities.

In April, participating students were divided into 13 groups and given the requirements of the project, which included creating at least one clothoid loop (which is narrow and oval), one inversion loop (which is similar to a twist), one steep drop, and one camel back. Each team was given $200 for materials through a grant from New Era Converting Machinery (a total of $2600). In addition to meeting the math and physics requirements, the completed designs needed to be sturdy, durable and open-topped. In the end, the goal was to create a coaster that would support a traveling marble throughout the loops for four to eight seconds.

Each group had to keep a journal to keep track of their experiences, successes and failures and solutions. Pasquale and McMann visited each team in the evenings at their home base to assist with technical difficulties throughout the building process.

Pasquale believes that this year’s coasters raised the bar on this assignment saying, “Students have worked very hard for two months and incorporated a lot more technological elements to the coaster models, such as lights, sounds, and 3D print designs.” One coaster, called the Electric Daisy Coaster, applied computer coding skillls to sync a light show with music, and another, named “The Coaster that Never Sleeps,” incorporated a 3D-printed Lady Liberty to decorate the coaster with the famous New York City icon.

McMann agreed that the projects were exceptional: “I think each year the students improve on the coasters from the year before. This was the most impressive year, which is a great credit to the students. Now we can’t wait for next year!”