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Paper Olympiad 2022

On October 7, the first edition of the Paper Olympiad was held in Lodz, Poland at the Bay of Sports of the University of Lodz. The organizer was the Center for Papermaking and Printing. 18 teams from secondary schools entered the competition. After the preliminaries, 11 teams took part in the finals. A total of 58 people participated in the Olympiad, together with their guardians.

Participants were to prepare:

• A flying structure made of more than one piece of paper and then conduct its test. The test consisted of a hand throw of this construction by one of the team members, from a designated place. Each team was allowed to perform the throw three times,
• The lightest possible metal ball pack. In this case, no other connecting materials – except paper – were allowed. The package had to have handles that would be used to suspend it from a PVC tube with a diameter of 5 cm and a length of 1 m. The design had to hold its contents for at least one minute. The main evaluation criterion would be the weight of the package. The weight of the balls provided: 0.5kg.
• As tall as possible structure with an empty weight of no more than 200g, with a flat platform on top that will hold a vertically placed 1.5L water bottle for at least 1 minute. Materials available: paper (various types), glue, staples, office clips.

All teams proceeded to complete the tasks with great enthusiasm and creativity.

The first to be tested were metal ball packs. All the constructions withstood the load, the winner was a simple basket by the Papierzaki Kwidzyniaki team with an exorbitant weight of 2.66 grams.

Next, towers were tested. The winner here was a simple structure in the form of a single tube with a carefully considered base. Despite its considerable height (147 cm), it was within the weight limit. It was made by the Różowe Misie team.

In the case of the flying structure, the star-shaped structure won. Thrown by one of the members of the Różowe Misie team, it soared to a distance of as much as 21 meters.

On behalf of the Olympic Committee, the winners were ceremoniously announced by the chairman of the judging committee, Dr. Konrad Olejnik:

1st place: Różowe Misie
II place: Papierzaki Kwidzyniaki
III place: Green City Designers

The awarded teams were presented with prizes: board games, portable hard drives, pendrives, headphones and wireless speakers.

A report on the Olympiad can be viewed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7s60bO8ax

Congratulations on a successful event and a fantastic atmosphere. We look forward to the next edition in 2023.

In the gallery below are some photos from the event. Photo source: Center for Papermaking and Printing of the University of Łódź (Facebook)