Local students finalists in 2025 West Virginia Bridge Design and Build Contest

BECKLEY, W.Va. (WVVA) - Several local students will be among the 26 high school teams and nine middle school teams that are heading to the West Virginia Bridge Design and Build Contest finals at the WVU Institute of Technology Campus in Beckley on Friday, March 28, 2025, and Saturday, March 29, 2025.

The 35 qualifying teams competed against 81 other teams from across the state of West Virginia to make it to the finals in this competition. Out of those 35 teams, 21 hail from our area in southern West Virginia.

The high school finalists include seven teams from Greenbrier East High School in Greenbrier County, five teams from Pikeview High School (Mercer County), three teams from Princeton Senior High School (Mercer County) and two teams Oak Hill High School (Fayette County).

The middle school finalists include three teams from Eastern Greenbrier Middle School in Greenbrier County, and one team from Park Middle School (Raleigh County).

The event – sponsored by the West Virginia Department of Transportation (WVDOT) for over 25 years – focuses on engineering by using real world design principles in the software with which students design their bridges. The Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) educational outreach program is part of the WVDOT’s ongoing commitment to education; the WVDOT also offers summer co-op programs, scholarships, and tuition reimbursements as they work to recruit tomorrow’s engineers and other professionals.

To advance to the final round of the competition, students had to use Engineering Encounters Bridge Designer 2025 software to design a bridge that a truck can cross successfully, cheaper than competitors’ spans. The top 35 teams on the leaderboard are invited to participate in the final competition, where they will design bridges in a timed activity using the software and also compete to test the strength to weight ratio of balsa bridges.

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