Day 14: Schnitzels and Slideshows

As we are finishing up week two, we started the day off with our second project presentations. The groups shown below spent the past week working with the data we collected back on day five of our journey here in Florida. Both groups used that data to put together a model that could help predict the queue buildup for the rides TRON and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad in Magic Kingdom.

Big Thunder Mountain Railroad Queue Group: Ashton, Dylan, Julia and Harrison (left to right)

TRON Queue Group: Della, Luke, and Cassie (left to right)

The other two groups that presented this morning focused on a very different topic. They have spent the past week working on a workforce scheduling model to figure out the number of staff needed at Ohana, a restaurant at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort, throughout the day.

Workforce Scheduling Group #1: Tram, Aidan, Mara, and Annmarie (left to right)

Workforce Scheduling Group #2: The Anh, Isabella, and Connor (left to right)

After spending the bulk of our morning on project two presentations, we went straight into project work for our Team Disney presentations. The Team Disney project presentations are coming up this Thursday, and it is a quick turnaround from the end of project two to finalizing presentations for Team Disney. Luckily, three of the four groups for the Team Disney presentations are assigned with presenting topics from projects one and two, so it is just a matter of finalizing from pre-existing slideshows to be ready for Team Disney. The other group is presenting about the traveling tourist problem and our race to complete twelve magic kingdom rides in one day from day six. While the timeline is short for our Team Disney presentations, the professors have provided lots of helpful feedback and are very willing to help out as we prepare to present some of our mathematical work to some real professionals in a couple of days.

Once groups were at a good spot in their projects, we headed to the parks to start collecting data for our third and final project. Since finding our presentation groups a few days ago, everyone has been getting very eager to start collecting their data. In order to get a start on this, 13 of us headed to EPCOT, while the remaining four went to Hollywood Studios. The group in EPCOT headed straight to Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind to start collecting data for one of the group's projects. Their project is centered on song distribution played on each cart during the ride. The group that went to Hollywood Studios went to the Tower of Terror to plan how they wanted to collect data regarding drop sequences in the ride.

Once the Guardians group finished the ride, they had free time before dinner. Some groups went to attractions like Imagination with Figment and were called to stretch their imaginations in the wildest ways possible. Some students dreamed of being professional mathematicians, some professional athletes, and others (like Tram) dreamed of becoming other animals, like a frog! While most seem to be content as humans, Tram kind of liked the idea of being a frog.

After the Tower of Terror group finished their data, they headed to EPCOT to meet the rest of the group after their free time for dinner at Biergarten. At dinner, we all enjoyed a delicious traditional German buffet meal.

At dinner, there was a German-style performance that included lots of singing and dancing. At one point, the performers started to sing the chicken dance. When the professors looked up on stage at this time, there were a lot of little kids up on stage and even a group of 14 college students stealing all of the spotlight. But who could have done this? Yep, you guessed it, that was all of us!

After stuffing our mouths with bratwurst, meatballs, and pretzels, we did the sensible thing and headed straight for the most thrilling rollercoaster ride that EPCOT has to offer. When we arrived at Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, the wait for the standby line was 105 minutes. While this may have seemed like a disappointment in the moment, it was likely a blessing in disguise, as it gave us time to digest our food before hopping on the ride. We eventually made our way to the front of the queue as excitement built for what is likely the group's favorite ride of the trip so far. We spun through outer space and saved the world with the Guardians of the Galaxy before exiting the ride with smiles written on all of our faces. As we walked towards the exits of the park, thinking to ourselves, “I could live in this moment forever.” Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. The reality of only a week remaining on this trip began to set in as we took the vans back to the hotel. We have all enjoyed the trip up to this point and can’t wait to finish the last week out strong!

This blog was written by Harrison Brown and Cassie Larsen