Richard Froese
South Peace News
Prairie River Junior High School in High Prairie won the third annual High Prairie School Division Junior High Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) competition March 13 at Kinuso School.
The team of Niya Mouallem, Grade 9, and Alaina Stecik, Grade 7, and a third student, who cannot be named under FOIP, won the event.
High Prairie won the first event in 2023 before Kinuso won the event in 2024.
The challenge was a Rube Goldberg machine using as many simple machines as possible, PRJH Science teacher Keith Davidson says.
“There were some great machines,” he says.
He adds schools and HPSD are eager to grow the event.
“We’re still looking to expand and improve our divisional STEM competition because it’s a great way for students to engage their critical-thinking skills,” Davidson says.
A Rube Goldberg machine is a chain reaction-type machine or contraption intentionally designed to perform a simple task in an indirect and impractically overly complicated way.
Usually, the machines consist of a series of simple unrelated devices; the action of each triggers the initiation of the next and eventually results in achieving a stated goal.
