JAMESTOWN, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – On February 8, 4-H members and adults braved the cold weather to attend the 2025 4- H Engineering and Design Challenge Kickoff Event at the NDSU Extension – Stutsman County office in Jamestown.

The Engineering and Design Challenge is a statewide 4-H event that is designed to help youth work together in teams to build a Rube Goldberg™ type machine to solve a task. Teams can then demonstrate their machines at the North Dakota State Fair in July.

Margo Bowerman, Extension Youth Development Specialist for STEM led the event, and Ben and Knoah Weber helped the kids experiment with hands-on engineering activities in which they solved challenges and learned to work together as a team. For the first challenge, teams were tasked with building a gravity feeder using simple supplies. The next task was to build a Trebuchet, which is a type of catapult that uses a rotating arm to launch a projectile. They then used those skills for the final challenge, which was to build a machine to Feed the Animals.

The adults that attended the event learned more about becoming involved in supporting a local team to compete at the State Event. They were given resources to teach the concepts of simple machines and other learning activities to reinforce the engineering and design concepts.

The event was offered free of charge with lunch included thanks to our generous sponsors. We would like to thank Hugo’s, Paradiso Mexican Restaurant – Jamestown and Domino’s Pizza – Jamestown for supporting this event.

For more information about 4-H, please contact the Extension Office in Jamestown at 701-252-9030.