Students showed more than 100 experiments

Published in the January 20 – February 2, 2016 issue of Morgan Hill Life

By Staff Report

Britton Middle School students Shalimar McGinnis, 14, and Sophie Benefiel, 13, love ice cream and they love science. Both girls decided to combine their passions with an experiment for the sixth annual Citywide Science Fair. Their project, called “Dairy Delight,” tested what ingredient would make the delicious frozen dessert the thickest — whole cow’s milk, almond milk or coconut milk.

The fun project got them third-place at the science in the chemistry category for middle school students.

McGinnis, the president of the Math Engineering Science Achievement club at Britton, said learning about the scientific world is “cool” because it lets students learn critical thinking and logic skills.

“I like playing with chemicals. Not dangerous chemicals,” she said. “Like, dry ice is the best. It’s so cool.”

Benefiel agreed that science is fun and encourages other students to participate in the annual science fair.

“It gives them more of an experience for the future. It’ll inspire them when they get into college to possibly go into a science career,” she said.

Morgan Hill Mayor Steve Tate took a tour of various high school and middle school science projects in the gym at Oakwood School and said he was impressed with what he saw coming from the minds of students.

“These kids are just wonderful,” he said. “They’ve all had a really good time doing their experiments and they’ve all said they got a lot out of it. It’s part of the learning process and presenting the results of their experiments.”

At this year’s science fair, five schools sent students to show off their experiments. Oakwood School had 77 projects and 12 wins, Britton had 38 projects and nine wins, Martin Murphy Middle School had nine projects and three wins, Jackson Academy of Math and Music had 2 projects and Silicon Valley Flex Academy had one project.

Morgan Hill Unified School District board president Bob Benevento said tomorrow’s scientists and engineers, people the likes of Thomas Edison and Nicholas Tesla, might be found among the students at the fair.

“The future technicians need to think about the what, how and why you should do something,” he said.

The 2016 Morgan Hill Annual Citywide Science Fair winners:

Engineering and Physics: (High School): first place: Sameer Varma (Oakwood); second place: Talia Hill (Oakwood); third place: Ashwin Visliesvaran and Ethan Ngo (Oakwood); Middle School: first place: Talia Vaillancourt (Britton); second place: Kenny Cohen (Britton); third place: Tyler Madden (Martin Murphy).

Chemistry: (High School): first place: Christian Hardoy (Oakwood); second place: Isabella Rickard (Oakwood); third place: Scott Spano (Oakwood); Middle School: first place Emily Munoz (Martin Murphy); second place: Molly Foster and Gillian McCaw (Britton); third place: Shalimar McGinnis and Sophie Benefiel (Britton).

Biological Sciences: High School: first place: Nike Wolf (Oakwood); second place: Sophia Koldewyn (Oakwood); third place: Andrew Keswick (Oakwood); Middle School: first place: Alyssa Bruno and Courtney Spisak (Britton); second place: Elijah Reyes (Britton); third place: Carlyn Littler and Delainey Weeks (Britton).

Behavorial Sciences: High School: first place: Emily Martin (Oakwood); second place: Eden Wolf (Oakwood); third place: Kyle Stickels (Oakwood); Middle School: first place: Michelle Nguyen and Nicole Katie Mescaros (Martin Murphy); second place: Lizette Lara (Britton); third place: Alexandria Cayme and Prizzy Bosuego (Britton).