Friday morning, dozens of school buses from districts across Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma pulled up for a routine end-of-the-year field trip exploring Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington.

But Ms. Jordan’s class had other plans, coming armed with notes, poster boards, and lots of questions.

This is a ninth-grade engineering class at IDEA Southeast College Prep. The students have studied the mechanics behind roller coasters all year.

“When I think about engineering, I think about roller coasters, too. You know, how do people put their minds into creating something like this, you know? And the roller coaster has been around for a really long time and just like the thought of like, maybe one day I’ll be able to make a roller coaster,” said Keylah Rios, a student in the class.

The students were divided into groups and studied different coasters in the park. Keylah, Kaiden, and Lennin studied Batman, the one where your legs dangle. They know all about the design, how it works, and what types of energy it uses. All the kids studied different coasters and then they got to come out here and see what they studied firsthand.

“This one is a block, so then once one goes, the sensors make sure that the other one doesn’t go, causing a collision,” said Kaiden Jackson.

The students were so into what they were learning that they became an attraction in the park. Teachers from Frisco ISD stopped them to ask questions. They were curious about what they were doing and impressed by the lesson plan that brought them here.

“I think the research part and the vocabulary is probably not the fun part to them, but when they understand the process of when you learn these things and it correlates to the physical or you physically putting these things together and applying it to what you learn, it’s more exciting to them,” said teacher Brandy Jordan.

Especially if you like roller coasters. Lennin Maldonado doesn’t, but he loves engineering.

“I like the mechanisms and parts and almost like assembling Legos, so since I’m also interested in architecture, it all seemed interesting to me,” he said.

Lennin was brave and ready to ride Batman, but when they showed up, it was shut down for maintenance.A bummer … or was it?