The “science geek” label often used with derision in years past is now fully embraced by students as a badge of honor, thanks in part to the STEM movement that has taken hold nationwide. STEM is short for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics, and with careers in computer engineering, Internet innovation and finance among the most lucrative out there, kids are not shy about being good at math and science.
Locally, many of these budding STEM enthusiasts participate in the Indian River Regional Science and Engineering Fair, the signature program of the Education Foundation of Indian River County. The 2016 event, which is open for public viewing this Saturday, Jan. 30 at Gifford Middle School, includes 320 elementary (K-5), 167 middle school (6-8) and 50 high school (9-12) projects. In 2015 more than $760,000 in college scholarships and academic awards were conferred at the regional level, with top presenters going on to compete at state levels and beyond.
“This comprehensive program is the driver of science curriculum in public and private schools in Indian River County. It is the one academic program that combines all educational disciplines together,” says Education Foundation executive director, Cynthia Falardeau. “It’s just so amazing to see where this program takes students.”
It’s an experience that helped empower three young women to follow their dreams.
Emily Salvador, a senior at Massachusetts Institute of Technology studying computer science and music, graduated in 2012 from Saint Edward’s School and participated from fourth grade through her senior year.
“It definitely helped me get into MIT in the first place. Having the continuity from 4th grade to high school was revealing to the MIT admissions council,” says Salvador.
A freshman year project on seahorses, utilizing seahorse tanks at the FIT Vero Beach Marine Laboratory, was one of her favorites. Senior year she worked on a multi-variable project at the USDA, applying three or four chemicals to determine the effect on the growth of sprouting plants. “It wasn’t really the project itself that was the intriguing part; it was the data analysis, because the scientific method says you change one variable and see what happens with another variable,” Salvador explains. “But in this project, I changed multiple variables and then I’d see what results I’d be able to extract.”
She believes that intense research experience also helped her to find positions in labs at a school where research is a large part of the curriculum. “They’re pretty competitive here at MIT.”
Salvador currently works at a media lab writing computer graphic simulation tools on a shape display project. “So the idea is that there’s a 2-D representation in pixels. How do you get it to be a 3-D physical item in the real world? That project’s really interesting to me because I’ve always been really interested in science, but I’ve also always been really interested in art so it’s interesting to combine the two.”
It was also of interest to Walt Disney Imagineering, the California-based theme park development group, which has offered her a job that she’s seriously considering. “If we go back to 4th grade dream jobs, it’s definitely on the top of my list,” says Salvador.
Karen Monuszko, a 2011 Vero Beach High School grad and 2015 graduate from Davidson College in North Carolina, entered her first science fair while attending Beachland Elementary and continued with projects through Gifford Middle School.
Her middle school projects not only garnered first place and best of show two years in a row at the regional level, she also took first place at the state level both years. The projects concerned the green tinge in blonde hair resulting from chlorine in the pool. In 7th grade Monuszko experimented with ways to remove the green and in 8th grade she searched for ways to prevent it from occurring. Feeling somewhat pressured after her wins, Monuszko took a break from the fair in high school.
She became interested in neuroscience research projects while in college and is currently interning with a hand surgeon to acquire some clinical experience before applying to medical school to become a neurosurgeon.
“Being in the science fair definitely helped me in my research in college. I did a very in-depth four-year project that culminated in an extensive thesis that I presented to the Society for Neuroscience National Convention. I had to do a lot of presenting and talking about it to other people,” says Monuszko. “It was a very challenging topic and it really helped to have already done this with the more entry-level type research that I did at the science fair. Just simple things like knowing how to do data analysis and basics about the scientific method was all ingrained in my brain from the science fair. And so when I had to do it with more complicated topics it was kind of just second nature.”
Encouraging students to participate, Monuszko adds, “you learn a ton. Even if you don’t end up engaging in research, everyone is bound to have a research-based class and the knowledge that you learn is really helpful. You learn to be comfortable speaking in front of people and explaining what you’ve learned and that really comes in handy numerous times in high school and college.”
Carly Ferguson Daniels, a 2005 Vero Beach High School graduate ,is in complete agreement. Daniels graduated in 2009 from the University of Florida in Gainesville and obtained her Ph.D. at UCLA in 2014. She is now a senior scientist at Pfizer in St. Louis, Missouri, developing analytical test methods for biotherapeutic medicines.
“I can’t really think of a time that I wasn’t interested in science. My dad is a scientist, not in the same field, but we grew up going out to the lab with him on the weekends,” says Daniels, whose father was then at Syngenta. She also worked with him on one of her favorite projects, determining the effect of fertilizer on the leaf miner insect, which continued over several grades and took her to the state level.
Initially planning to enter medical practice, she got involved with the American Medical Student Association in college and worked at a clinic in Gainesville while simultaneously doing scientific research in a lab. “I found that I enjoyed the lab work better than the clinical work.”
She says putting a project together, coming up with questions and collecting data you hope will answer those questions, are all skills worth cultivating.
“One of the biggest takeaways is developing very solid thinking skills,” says Daniels. “Being able to look at your results and think critically, making sure that they’re valid and that you’re actually answering the questions. That for me was the bigger takeaway because the actual projects that I worked on were in a different field than what I did in college.”
Like Monuszko, Daniels says presenting and answering questions about a project greatly helps with public speaking and adds that the overall process helps to develop clear thinking.
“I had a very good experience with the science fair,” says Daniels. “Vero’s a tiny town, but the fair is really well put together and I think they get a really good breadth of projects. I will say it was nice how supportive all of the teachers were about it too.”