How to build bridges and make them last.
 
Between thirty and forty students built and put their bridges to the test in the hopes of winning a cash prize and trophy for having one of the three strongest structures on Saturday at the 17th Annual Popsicle Stick Bridge Building Contest at St. Theresa Catholic Secondary School in Belleville.
 
Trophies were also awarded for Most Promising Bridge Builder, Best Looking Bridge and Most Innovative Design.
 
More than 120 people attended the 2019 edition of the event that is part of National Engineering Month.
 
National Engineering Month Treasurer and Organizer in Quinte Panch Yogeswaren said part of the experience is the when the structures the elementary students have made begin to collapse.
 
"When they start breaking the bridges, everybody claps and everybody shouts about it, it's just fun -- it's fun for the organizers, too!"   
 
The popsicle stick bridges are place in the middle of a vice-like mechanism, with the participant increasing pressure on their bridge in the form of weight until it breaks.
 
As the competition got underway on Saturday morning, one of the first structures withstood a weight of seventy-five pounds and another withstood forty-two pounds of pressure until it collapsed.
 
Yogeswaren added that events like this one have become more popular as math and science have over the years.
 
In addition to learning how to build the strongest structure popsicle sticks and glue, Yogeswaren said it is also about encourging particpants to pursue careers in math, science or engineering.
 
He has heard about many students going on to university and as a teacher continues to encourage young people as a teacher to work in those fields.
 
"Do science, do mathematics and do engineering. That's what I encourage all the children when I go to school."
 
Yogeswaren continued, "I think you need engineering over here because you build bridges and you see what's really happening. Some of them (students) don't like to because they wanted to be a lawyer, an accountant and other things -- it doesn't really matter as long as they study."