News Clips: Science Fair 2016

Science fair comes around once a year, every year to the overwhelming disappointment of every freshmen and sophomore. Researching, writing, and presenting the chosen information is a process that takes several months, or several, grueling days, depending on the student. We all know this; we’ve all been part of it; and we know that the months (or less) of work that only culminate to a tiring afternoon of presentations seems very anticlimactic, but never comes soon enough. The presentations themselves can be very difficult for some people, especially if they didn’t research something they’re interested in.

In the last year or two, many things have stayed the same, such as the cramped organization of the tables that leads to some awkwardly close, unavoidable conversations, but some things have also changed. The science department has opened up the projects to include humans or animals as subjects of experiments. Of course no animals were harmed in the making of any projects, but including a mammal as the subject of the project was not allowed when I participated. My classmates and I had to scrounge around for ideas that had nothing to do with people, even though every google search came up with topics about people. And like all my classmates, I ended up researching stuff like different types of dirt, which my mother was thrilled about, or the amount of butter in cookies, which could be cool except for the fact that I couldn’t eat the majority of the cookies because they were quite disgusting.

And what is the point of making cookies that you can’t eat?

There is no point, you may be thinking. But the answer is actually science. Of course.

This year at the Science Fair, I observed a number of familiar topics near and dear to my heart like “How Butter Can Affect the Length and Width of Cookies”, and other creative ones like “Burn, Baby Burn: Unscented vs. Scented Candles”. Among these classics, I also saw new projects like “The Effects of Blue Light on the Number of Good Sleeping Hours and Waking Up”, “Electronic Devices: Helpful or Harmful for Focusing?”, and “Effect of Gender on Comprehension of Optical Illusions”. It was refreshing to see a batch of fresh, new ideas, even if I was incredibly bitter about my successors’ freedom. However, what’s done is done, and eventually every student completes their obligatory two years of Science Fair with a better understanding of the scientific method and scientific research paper. And as Science Fair continues and changes, the projects that once seemed common and boring to my class will become old news as the new classics roll in.

Photos Courtesy of Amanda Weydt