By Caroline Hermann
Several regional high school students received top awards at the Region 5 Southeastern Mass. science fair held March 12 at Bridgewater State University.
Sophomore Curtis Fisher won big with a first place prize, as well as the INTEL Computer Science Award and the Naval Award, for a project in which he built a geostationary communication satellite.
“I’m really interested in technology, so I started this project to do something fun that other people can use and build at home. I really didn’t expect to go this far,” he said.
Sophomore Rose Engler said, “Kat and I were offered a spot at the regional fair after winning second place overall at our high school fair and we took it.” Kat and Rose went on to win second place, and a $50 prize, at the regional fair for building a solar-powered cell phone.
During multiple rounds of judging, students were asked various questions about their projects and had to explain their procedures in great detail. Once the judging was done and all the projects had been given a score, the judges gave the highest-ranking projects an award in their respective category.
Senior Nils Aldeborgh also received a second place prize for his project on sustainable railways. Freshman Mackenzie Condon took an honorable mention with her project “Determining the Effect of Elevated Ocean Acidification Levels On Oyster Shells.”
Junior Savanna Aiello received a third place award for her project “Scratching the Surface,” where she tested which materials would construct the best figure skate. “I’m really not a science person, but combining it with something that I liked made me appreciate the use of science.”
Other regional fair attendees included junior Camilla Prata with “Single-use to Multi-Use Paper Products,” freshman Addy Hayman with “The Adaptivity of Slime Molds In Mazes,” and juniors Daniel Gaines and David Webster with “Utilizing Recycled Polystyrene as a Substitute for Concrete and Asphalt to Replace Road and Sidewalk Surfaces.”
At the fair, regional high school science fair coordinator, Jackie Hermann, accepted a trophy for the school and its teachers for outstanding commitment and dedication to their students and the science fairs. The award is presented to schools with first-place winners from the previous year’s fair.
Last year’s first-place winner for the high school was Christopher Aring with his “Augmented Reality Sand Table.”
Curtis, Rose, Kat, Nils, Savanna, Daniel, David, and Mackenzie will continue on to the state fair at MIT in May.
