High school is a bridge for students to grow from sheltered adolescents to professionals in various career fields. Every year, Parkway Central’s engineering team is called upon to solve a real world problem – just like the professionals. The Gateway Arch National Park Engineering Contest presents a local engineering problem for aspiring high school students to create a solution to. It takes place in the McKelvey Engineering complex in Whitaker Hall, on Washington University’s campus.
This year, engineering teacher Brandon Franck prepared a team of seven students to complete the challenge: design a pedestrian bridge that would connect the national park’s north overlook to the historic Eads Bridge. The team came in fourth, with the team’s co-captains senior Aaron Loudenback and Kathryn Ho making it to the all-tournament team. Additionally, Ho won the Taylor Tuleja McKelvey Award for Creativity and Ingenuity.
Both Loudenback and Ho plan on studying engineering related subjects in college. They were interviewed about their interest and aspirations in engineering.
Marble Run Track Enthusiast
Loudenback has been interested in engineering since he was eight. Growing up, he constantly sought out engineering and physics tutorial videos to explore. A birthday gift from his sister, according to Loudenback, inspired him to pursue engineering.
“My sister gave me a marble run track for my birthday,” Loudenback said. “[You can] build them up in many different ways, and see how everything works. There’s a big physics aspect to it, [and] It really lets me be creative and work with all these designs.”
Engineering became a part of Loudenback’s academic life. In middle school, Loudenback built different “run tracks” using an online simulator and joined the school’s robotics team. In high school, he joined the Technology Student Association and took different engineering classes taught by Franck.
“Mr. Franck’s civil engineering course intrigued me the most,” Loudenback said. “And that was what led me to join the bridge project at WashU.”
In his many experiences with engineering, Loudenback faces various challenges. He described himself as someone who “just like one solution”. The complexity of different solutions can be both frustrating and rewarding to him.
“I want to be a person that knows 100% [if] I’m right or wrong, but the open endedness of it is just something that I just had to get used to,” Loudenback said. “But the process of picking a design, presenting it, and then going back to optimize it is a very innovative process.”
This year, Loudenback’s engineering independent study project allowed him to lead the Parkway Central team in the contest. He believed this was the best engineering event he did so far. Throughout the design process, he learned how to communicate with different people to succeed.
“We had some conflicts with picking the design, so meeting frequently helped us to talk,” Loudenback said. “Also Kathryn and I planned meetings with actual engineers from the firm. Speaking to engineering experts on our project was really helpful as well.”
Another aspect of the contest that Loudenback appreciated was the judging and feedback. The presentation helped him gain insight into real-world engineering and prepare him for higher education.
“This [contest] was my first experience getting to present and show my design to actual engineer [judges], so more than just presenting the classmates,” Loudenback said. “It was a really fun experience. They gave me a lot of feedback to take note of.”
Loudenback hopes to pursue a career in architectural or civil engineering in the future. He applied to numerous engineering schools, hoping to meet professors and gain general knowledge in mathematics and physics to help him succeed in his field. He credited Franck as his mentor and someone influential on his engineering career.
“Mr. Franck was really open with me. He was a great teacher, and he made his class really engaging and something I would look forward to every day,” Loudenback said. “He really wanted me to do it [the engineering contest], and it was a profound experience.”
Award-winning Problem Solver
Ho started exploring the field of engineering in sophomore year when she was considering her future college studies. In junior, she took Franck’s drafting class and went to an aerospace engineering camp in junior summer.
“I feel like my interests are more aligned with STEM classes. I want to study architecture, and to learn some of those skills like problem solving and modeling,” Ho said. “So that’s [engineering is] like another field to explore.”
In her family, Ho’s cousin studied electrical engineering. Ho cited her as an influential figure in her studies.
“My parents didn’t graduate from college,” Ho said. “But I would say my cousin [influenced me to study engineering] and she’s a very strong woman, definitely a role model for me.”
The problem-solving aspect and different layers of design in engineering interests Ho. She believes engineering is about picking a solution with the least possible flaws.
“There’s not always one solution for it, but there’s definitely a best solution,” Ho said. “You can work towards making something more efficient.”
This year, she is involved in an engineering independent study project. Ho learned about the contest through Franck in September and decided it’s a good opportunity for her. She led the team through the design process and believed they had good teamwork.
“There were definitely times where we got more riled up than we needed to be,” Ho said. “But overall, we were respectful of each other’s ideas and we wanted to figure out what was best for our design.”
The most challenging in projects, Ho said, is the initial design process. For the contest, she and her teammates had to narrow down different ideas and what’s the best solution.
“During the competition, our initial design process took the most amount of time,” Ho said. “[We spent] weeks just debating what was best for the project and what would work.”
Beside designing the solution, the team also has to practice speaking their idea. The contest requires the team to present an executive summary where they pitch their idea for the judges to bid on. Ho explained it’s helpful to practice in front of a crowd.
“We practiced in front of Mr. Franck’s aclab,” Ho said. “It was good for [us] talking in front of people and finding out what we need to improve on presentation wise.”
Although Ho had to leave early and didn’t attend the awards ceremony afterwards, she got the result that the team placed fourth and she won the individual award Taylor Tuleja McKelvey Award for Creativity and Ingenuity. She was surprised about her individual award.
“I was really shocked, likeI did not expect to win it at all,” Ho said. “But I’m really grateful to Mr. Frank, who nominated me for the award.”
Thinking beyond high school, Ho wanted to continue pursuing her love for design and STEM subjects. She is planning on studying architecture in college and follow the path in the future.
“I think it [architecture] best suits my abilities like logic and problem solving, but also creativity and design, which I really love.” Ho said.
