Mill Creek students earn science accolades
Mill Creek Elementary School students recently competed in the North Alabama and the Alabama state science and engineering fairs.
Megan Davies, from left, Alfred Alwin and Reynolds Cannon from Mill Creek Elementary School were winners at the Alabama State Science and Engineering Fair.
“Science fair projects (allow) students to engage in hands-on activities and conduct authentic experiments,” fair coordinator Jacqueline K. Smith said. While reading is integral in science, Smith’s students excel “when given the chance to learn science … by actually doing science.”
In behavioral and social science at the regional meet, fifth-grader Claire Amey took first place for studying the relationship of being left- or right-handed and left- or right-eye dominance. Sydney Anna Matheney won second place and Christopher Robert Day was third.
For biological science, Kiara Robinson took second place and Grace Edgar was fourth. Physical science winners were Jessica Alyssa Kramer, first, for a gauss rifle to demonstrate magnetic linear acceleration; Hannah Bryant, second; and Everest Litchford, fourth.
In sixth grade, Alfred V. Alwin earned third place in chemistry, while Joshua Bryant received honorable mention. Megan Davis took second place in engineering; Reynolds Cannon, third; and Akash Oijha and Jessica Whigman, honorable mention. Caitlin A. Wesson captured fourth place in environmental science.
Special award winners were Alfred V. Alwin, Joshua Bryant, James Maynard, Taylor Romanczuk, Jessica Alyssa Kramer and Caitlin A. Wesson.
At the Alabama Science and Engineering Fair, Megan Davies earned third place in engineering. Alfred Alwin in chemistry and Reynolds Cannon in aerodynamics received honorable mentions.
Mill Creek had 62 entries in its fair. “The regional fair had 41 in the fifth-grade division and 210 in the junior division,” Smith said.
The different categories “are based upon the science concept being tested,” Smith said. “For example, experiments involving plants are in the biological science division.”
Smith works with science fairs because “students get to select their own topic, so the projects have more personal meaning. As a teacher, it’s very rewarding for me to see students’ enthusiasm for learning and research.”
Grants from the Science and Technology Education and Training (STEDTRAIN) committee with the Huntsville Association of Technical Societies (HATS) funded much of the equipment and supplies for projects.
