Every year, thousands of teenagers from around the world compete in the Breakthrough Junior Challenge. They’re tasked with creating a short video about a complex topic in physics, math or life science and judged based on engagement, illumination, creativity and difficulty.
That sounded like the perfect competition for Mathew Ruggieri.
“I like to take on challenges and challenge myself, so I thought it would be really cool to make something that challenged my ability for storytelling and also education,” he said.
Ruggieri has loved filmmaking for many years. In high school, he took part in University Interscholastic League filmmaking challenges, and even entered a documentary in the Heart of Texas Film Fest.
He originally competed in the Breakthrough Junior Challenge in 2022. His short film on gravitational lensing barely missed the cutoff for being named a finalist. So this year, he decided to give it another try.
“My whole mindset was just to take the video I made, two years prior and just completely revamped it and make it like 100% better and that’s what I did,” he said.
Ruggieri didn’t change his topic, though. Just his video.
He said he wanted to stick with gravitational lensing because doing these videos gave him a new perspective on gravity as a whole.
“I was just fascinated with the concept of light, you know a massless particle, being influenced by the gravitational pull of objects in space,” Ruggieri said. “Specifically how the gravity interacts with the spacetime grid and that’s what causes the light to bend.”
And if you still don’t get gravitational lensing, that’s okay. I didn’t get it during our interview either. But in his new video, Ruggieri’s able to use examples, like a river bending, to better explain it.
He says even after all his research and work on the topic, he’s still amazed by gravity.
“We kind of take it for granted. And it makes you think that on a humongous, humongous scale, that is space, … that gravity can even pull light,” he said.
For this year’s competition, Ruggieri used more demonstrations and quick transitions, emulating the YouTube vlog styles he grew up watching. He said this helped propel his video to the final stages.
Those are skills he’s spent years building. Long before Ruggieri was competing in international competitions, he was just a kid shocking his teachers. His mentor, Robinson ISD AV Director Willie Thomas, met him when in a third grade GT program.
“I was working with his teacher, and he was doing stop motion with legos, and which was at Robinson, unheard of. You at that time, seeing a student at that level produce that type of video,” Thomas said.
Mr. Thomas has continued to mentor Ruggieri over the years.
“It’s been extremely inspiring. I share his story a lot with a lot of our students, that’s been a real inspiration. And just to see him grow his passion into, I’m hoping, a career,” he said.
During the Breakthrough Junior Challenge’s popular vote phase, which runs until Friday, the public can vote on Facebook and YouTube for their favorite videos.
The video with the most likes is placed directly into the final round of judging, skipping the selection committee. The winner will be announced in November.
If Ruggieri wins, he’ll receive a scholarship, his math teacher Mr. Craig Thornton will receive $50,000 and Robinson High School will receive a new science lab.
Ruggieri never imagined his video would have made it this far, but the journey has taught him not to give up.
“I could have stopped after the first time because it was technically, I guess, a failure. You, know I didn’t advance at all, I could have just stopped and been like oh, there’s no point in doing this,” he said. “And I think that’s the biggest thing that I learned, that to just not be afraid to shoot your shot”
To find, and vote for, Mathew Ruggieri’s video on gravitational lensing, visit the Breakthrough Facebook and YouTube pages.
