Wednesday, April 25, 2001
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Wednesday, April 25, 2001 |
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Three Fayette teams advance to national Science Olympiad Fayette's future scientists and inventors from Rising Starr Middle, J.C. Booth Middle and McIntosh High will vie for the title of national champions during the National Science Olympiad Competition. Getting selected to participate in the national competition is no easy feat. First, teams from the middle and high school level must place in the top four at the regional level to advance to the state contest. In order to get to the national level, teams must place either first or second in state competition. Rising Starr was Georgia's middle school state champion, followed by Booth, who brought home the second-place trophy at the statewide competition held recently in Columbus. On April 14, McIntosh won the title in the high school state championship held at Emory University. Although their teams are not heading to the national championship competition next month, both Flat Rock Middle and Sandy Creek High competed and scored well at the state level. Flat Rock placed ninth and Sandy Creek seventh. In order to become the national champion, not only will Fayette's schools have to out score top Science Olympiad teams from other states, but Rising Starr and Booth Middle will also have to go up against each other as they contend for the top honor in their division. Booth is no stranger to winning national championships, having won five in a row. However, Mary Wilde, Science Olympiad coach at Booth, says that competition from other schools within the state is making the contest more challenging each year. "We are finding that our biggest competition is coming from systems within our own state. We know that Rising Starr is going to be a tough competitor and we are practicing hard so that we can hold onto the national championship title," Wilde explains. This year will mark Booth's 10th consecutive year of going to the national competition. Wilde says one of her strategies is to look for students who are team players. During the national competition, students must compete in a total of 23 events and each one requires working with at least two people. Wilde's team also studies hard throughout the year preparing for the national championship. After-school practices and lock-in study sessions at the school help to build knowledge and teamwork. Rising Starr has competed on the national level two times prior to this year. The school took 24th place the first time out and placed sixth last year. Although this will be the school's third time at the national competition, Rising Starr is sure to be one of the competition's fiercest competitors. "I am very proud of the team and what they have accomplished. This is a very competitive program and to get this far is a real testimony to all of the hard work and dedication the students have shown all year long," says Marge Counts, one of the Science Olympiad coaches at Rising Starr. Science Olympiad is an international nonprofit organization whose goals are to improve the quality of science education, increase student interest in science, and recognize outstanding achievement in science students and science teachers. The Olympic-style competition was created in 1983 as an alternative to traditional science teaching methods, science fairs and single-discipline academic tournaments. Instead of memorization and textbooks, students engage in hands-on discovery of cross-curriculum theories and principles. Relying on teamwork, discipline, commitment, and determination, students experience achievement under real-world rigorous academic interscholastic individual and team events in biology, chemistry, earth science, physics computer science, and engineering. Currently, the Science Olympiad involves participants from nearly all of the 50 states and more than 12,000 K-12 schools. Approximately 2,500 middle school and high school students will compete in the 2001 National Science Olympiad to be held May 18-19. Fayette Science Olympians are listed below.
J.C. Booth Middle School 7th grade: Daniel Bass, Allison Fratto and Andrew Wedemeyer. 8th grade: Alyssa Anderson, Rahul Basu, Kevin Goelz, Karen Ketsche, Nike Massengale, Bryan Odakura, Steven Perry and Steven Piasta. 9th grade: Whitney Baker, Christine Hedge and Shirley Li, Nate Reddy.
Flat Rock Middle School 6th grade: Ashley Ellis, Ashley Watts, Joseph Cunningham, Ravi Dayabhai and Laura O'Donnell. 7th grade: Josh Preston, Kenny Charron, Patrick Herron, Kip Dunlap, Owen Anderson, Michael DiGiusto, Jeremy Holcombe, Dani Slaton, Jacquelyn Bracco, Kyle Johns and Scott Long. 8th grade: Sajjad Menghani.
Rising Starr Middle School 6th grade: David Lowry, Jennifer Schildmeyer, alternate, Jack Larsh, alternate, Andrew Ash, Craig Huffman, Paul Winchester, alternate, Andrew Zheng, Evan Ferree, alternate and Andrew Marble, alternate. 7th grade: Davis Grisham and Brett Lorber. 8th grade: Daniel Shankle, alternate, Devin Harrington and Brett LeBrecque. 9th grade: Tim Legare, Matt Grisham, Nate Overall, Danny O'Shaughnessy, Michael Kozial and Sankar Sridaran.
McIntosh High School 9th grade: Daniel Lin, Patrick Thomas and Ton Wyatt. 10th grade: Cale Austin, Tori Fratto, Robert Huefner, Ben Lorber, John Powers, Reah Rogers and Chris Taylor. 11th grade: Chris Baudhuin, Tony Hung, Kate Schmid and Rik Wyatt. 12th grade: David Condon, Andrew Henebry, Christina Mojica, Kathryn Murphy, Yosuke Nomura, Lindsay O'Connor and Brian Williams.
Sandy Creek High School 9th grade: Brian Johns. 10th grade: Peter Davenport. 11th grade: Mike Brennison, Simon Coleman, Karthi Karunanidhi, Arif Noorani, Lawrence O'Donnell, Mark Smits, Kevin Watson and Jimmy Watts. 12th grade: Jesse Dukes, Nick Giglio, Anuj (Manny) Mahajan, Ryan Ratto and Andrea Van Buren.
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