For the past three weeks, students in physics teacher Trish Hovey’s class have been working on the ultimate test of intelligence and practical importance: The Egg Drop.

Using only flat toothpicks and glue, students were required to construct a contraption designed to hold and protect a large egg as it dropped five meters. Some students were successful. Most were not.

Noah Hollenbeck, junior, was among the few to find success in this physics endeavor. “We used the wrong toothpicks, but it still worked,” he said. “We made our toothpicks go in X’s, so they would crumple first and the egg would stay safe.”

“I made sure the egg would fit snugly in the contraption,” said junior Sophia Hurley, another successful student. “I lined the outside of the contraption with toothpicks and a three-pronged formation of toothpicks and glue. That way when it hit the ground they would splay out and break the fall of the egg, therefore increasing the impact time and allowing it to land smoothly on the concrete.”

For weeks, students worked hard to create a cohesive device that could adequately fulfill the task at hand. But as eggs upon eggs shattered on the floor in front of the gym, despite the hours put into the project by hardworking students, they failed to entirely complete their goal of sustaining an unbroken egg.