Middle school students launch water bottle rockets during hands-on STEM event

The students explored the principles of aerodynamics and propulsion by designing, building, and launching these rockets during a workshop held at Lincoln Laboratory.
October 29, 2026
Barbra Gottschalk | Communications & Community Outreach Office
A student and Laboratory staff are outside surrounded by trees, holding a wooden foundation while a rocket blasts off with a stream of water behind it.
Middle school students launch water bottle rockets that they designed and built during a workshop at Lincoln Laboratory. Photo: Glen Cooper / Lincoln Laboratory

In early October, middle school students from Brockton, Massachusetts, gathered at Lincoln Laboratory to explore aerodynamics, propulsion, and the laws of motion by building and testing their own water bottle rockets. The workshop was a new addition to the Laboratory's Middle School STEM Program, a series of hands-on learning activities that introduce kids to careers related to science and engineering.

Two students watch two small parachutes fall from a raised platform.
Before building their rockets, students experienced the aerodynamics concepts they learned using miniature parachutes, foam gliders, and rockets. Photo: Glen Cooper / Lincoln Laboratory

In this workshop, students stepped into the role of an aerospace engineer. The session kicked off with an introduction to Newton’s laws of motion, and how forces such as thrust, weight, lift, and drag impact flight. Transitioning from theory to fabrication, the students then designed and built their own custom rockets from water bottles, counterbalances, cardstock fins, and nosecones.

After adding water and pressurizing the launch system, students sent their designs flying into the sky. They then adopted the design-build-fly-learn prototype engineering cycle, and modified their rockets after each launch to go higher, faster, and farther.

"The event was a super success!" says John Yirrell, a Laboratory staff member from the Systems Engineering Group who was the instructor for the course. "The students were really invested in building their rockets and making them their own."

John Yirrell sits between two students at a table inside the Laboratory as the students put red tape around an empty bottle.
Laboratory staff member John Yirrell helps students build their rockets before testing. Photo: Glen Cooper / Lincoln Laboratory

Contact [email protected] for more information about the program.