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We (I) need to focus less on motivating students to do work on that level, and focus more on fostering the curiosity that will get students interested and invested enough to explore the topic on their own.

Not one student I talked to, mentioned a teacher having to “push” them. They all sounded very self-motivated.

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The amount of posters that were affiliated with universities and colleges. As I listened to the students discuss resources they used, however, it became clear that a lot of their projects and research would have been impossible with traditional high school science resources.

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Student projects tended to be broadly based on the students interests, with students narrowing the scope of the project as their high school experience went on.

Many projects had university affiliations (logo) on their posters.

All students seemed excited and ready to speak about their topic. All students sounded very self-motivated, with interventions very limited from teachers. Only seemed to assist with scope, resources, and connections.

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This experience has shown me that passion and purpose are the foundation of a good research project. I was able to attend the citizen science session and the projects through citizen science that had the most engagement and participation were those that the public had special interests in- whether that be for the community they lived in or their own personal interests. What could take a student to the next level in a research project like this is having it connect to something personal for them.
This experience has also shown me how different my students are, ability-wise, from the students that were presenting here. It has me wondering what I could do as an educator to start getting students to that level, or if maybe my expectations for them are not high enough?

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This experience showed me that getting a student invested in a research project means that they have to be passionate about what they are researching. I feel like my students don't have any idea that a science project is possible for them and I am going to do a better job in letting them know/encouraging them to step outside of their comfort zone to explore the possibility of contributing to a science fair!

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First, I'm really grateful for the opportunity to come on this student research trip. I feel like the district values teachers and is willing to invest in the teachers to get student learning to improve. This has been a great cohort of teachers and I have actually probably learned more through talking to the teachers than each session, but it was all helpful.
Most of the student research projects were above and beyond what I could help my students do at school. However, the ones that could be done in a school lab were relatively easy. They just stood out because they are original. I think OPS students can produce the same high quality projects with community partners. I would be interested in getting a list together of community partners willing to work with our students. I am also curious on how to scaffold middle school research so students are ready for higher level work in high school. I would also be interested in meeting up with this group next year to see how research has been implemented in each school since going to this conference.
I think that I have a better understanding of end goals for student research and how far students really can go. My limitations of knowledge have hindered my students going above and beyond. I'm hoping that with the knowledge of this content I can know how to better help my students.

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I saw students partnering with universities, which gave them access to advanced methods and materials. There were students that were independent and those that worked with people in their own school.

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Molly Felten I was surprised with the amount of high level vocabulary, extent of projects, and how some of them were built upon other years of research. I didn't know that students could just organize big data and not do an experiment. The more basic experiments that were done outside of the universities interested me more than the ones that were just a PostDocs idea of a good job. 

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Molly Felten I was surprised with the amount of high level vocabulary, extent of projects, and how some of them were built upon other years of research. I didn't know that students could just organize big data and not do an experiment. The more basic experiments that were done outside of the universities interested me more than the ones that were just a PostDocs idea of a good job. 

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A large number of posters used C. elegans in their research projects.
The level of knowledge that the students were demonstrating was very high.
The number of projects that had support from a university lab.

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These posters were amazing for student work. I noticed that many of the projects partnered with a community partner in order for students to be engaged in a lab. I liked how all of the poster formats were a little different. I even saw posters that were made of printed fabric so they could be folded instead of rolled. Students were highly engaged in their topics and enjoyed sharing their information. I could tell they were proud of their projects. I liked the posters that had the citations at the bottom rather than just references section. The color coding on the posters made them easy to read and attracting. Our students could do the projects that were presented if they had the same help.

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AAAS notes on Green Toxicology, Finding the Lost Einsteins, and  Driving Ocean and climate solutions

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I noticed a lot of the projects were partnered with a university. The posters varied greatly in the different sections that were included (i.e. Methods, Analysis, Purpose, Results, etc...). Many of the posters were indicative of very high level thinking, discussing content that would be taught in college level courses. There were many of them that had papers to go along with their research.

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This experience makes me want to work hard to introduce a research class at South and encourage students to come with me to compete in science competitions. I am willing to put in the leg work to make this possible after talking with Tracy and Dara, and I know I will face resistance and pitfalls, so I am ready. I feel a tremendous amount of support and collaboration, so I know if I ask my colleagues for help and troubleshooting ideas, I have friends that will come to my aide. Seeing the posters of junior presenters gives me a few ideas of areas that are uncovered - a leg up on our competition. Being able to see professors and researchers present new work showed me new areas of science that I can direct our students to - for example, the mini-brain model seems to be a big deal right now (and I have a lot students interested in neuroscience). Networking and seeing all types of research was incredibly insightful and though not everything I saw was directly related to a standard, I generated an idea about how to use what I saw and incorporate it into my class. The biggest theme that I have seen from every presentation is the importance of generating a good experimental model and being able to show an actual relationship (using statistics) between a generated hypothesis and the data. At the AJAS presentations, I noticed that students drew (sometimes wild) conclusions about their work. Some students seemed to lack critical thinking And assumed that their findings were substantial enough to make a claim (thank you Katie!). Students didn’t recognize that sometimes your work comes up empty handed, and the findings don’t always support the claim. I also saw a lack of definition of a control because that can make or break the validity of an experiment, and students didn’t seem to understand what their control should be or perhaps didn’t use enough controls in their experiments (negative and positive are both sometimes necessary). Overall, this was an amazing experience and I am ready to go back and build a team that can one day compete here!

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SHANNON JOHNSON
My students are great at collaborating with others and making relationships with business partners in the community, and I believe to get my students to this level of achievement, it will definitely take a village. In order for my students to be able to take an interest in research, it will require recruitment, time, space, and materials, so I am going to need to reach out and do some networking myself. I think, after what I saw, tackling problems close to home (or even as Katie M suggested, even in our schools) is something our kids can take a personal interest in. We can use this as a platform to help kids get to the next level and grow their science and analytical skills. Being able to go home and show them pictures and give them descriptions of what other kids their age are doing can be a positive motivator, and I am definitely using that to inspire and recruit them. I just don’t want my kids to take credit for the work of others, and I think when they take responsibility for solving local problems that they, themselves, identify, this won’t be an issue. I definitely also want to stress the importance of giving credit where credit is due, a huge deal in the science community.

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I had the opportunity to go to the AJAS oral presentations this afternoon, and it became very clear that a lot of these students were not presenting original work - they were just piggy backing off the work of their university mentors. Many of the oral presentations were clearly regurgitations of the work, and students were unable to answer questions at the end.

In spite of this, there were some students who definitely were original in their projects. One student used spectrophotometry to determine if amoeba and eulenga(sp?) could be used to clean up oil spills. It was clear that it was her own work because her project was deeply personal. When asked what inspired her to complete the project, this student explained that her grandparents were farmers in Iowa and an oil pipeline was supposed to be built through the family’s farm. She felt that there needed to be a solution to clean up a potential oil spill.

In our conversation afterwards, Shannon pointed out that there were a lot of potential issues with the project. For example, the bacteria could be producing a by-product that could have negative effects or be hazardous. However, I think that’s where the students are really going to learn from these projects - by hearing the constructive criticism of other scientists. Students will hopefully learn through this research experience that science doesn’t occur in an instant - it takes time to learn and there are way more factors to be explored than just those the student identifies.

Thinking ahead to student research in OPS - when students are beginning to plan their projects, I am going to encourage my students to identify either a problem or question in our school or community. I think starting local will be more beneficial to the students than going to a university and asking for a research project to be handed to them. Additionally, i think if we did need to use the resources of our local university or local businesses, we might be more successful if the student already has an question/problem and method than if we simply ask for it to be given to us.

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SHANNON JOHNSON
I asked specifically who the presenting students worked with to produce their posters and data, and many said they worked for a professor in a lab. The other answer I heard was that students collected their own materials and worked independently and didn’t really include that they received help from others. I am not sure how to think about this....I know that students like to take ownership of their work, but I did feel (and I am sorry to say this again) that there is a lot of help with project generation that was just given to them, with a few exceptions. I would like to see our students at  South generate their own ideas and do their own work in the lab instead of having a grad student or professor generate data and ideas for them. I would also like to see my students acknowledge all the help they receive from people around them to make them successful.

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-          To get a student to this level takes a lot of scaffolding and support, even if they are self-motivated:  Experimental Design, Data Analysis, Statistical Measures, Citations/Research, on top of equipment use.

-          Many of our students that engage in this project, it will be their first time even seeing work done at this level.  But I’ve seen them rise to the occasion before!

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Most, but not all, projects had connections to universities or at least access to a doctorate mentor. This provided them access to instruction, and materials. However there were a number of 'low tech' projects too, and self-taught students.

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-          Many projects had been worked on for a couple years, not just a semester.
- the wide use of statistical measures, and the students having a good grasp of their purpose and necessity.

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-          Lots of biology, very few engineering/physics projects

-          Great grasp of experimental design, calibration, assumptions, etc.

-          Many ideas initiated by professor/mentors – but not all.  This is usually the case in actual research settings too, but doesn’t mean the student didn’t have an active part in the direction of the research.

-          IMO “best” projects had students understanding possible impact on the field/society without overstating importance.

-          Many similar resources used, machine learning packages, scientific data mining, similar bio-organisms used.

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SHANNON JOHNSON
I was surprised (negatively) that some students’ work was based off of the ideas of a researcher they worked for. This was counterintuitive to me, because I wanted to see students present their own unique, innovative ideas instead of becoming a grad student in high school. I was surprised (positively) that some students’ work was completely their own, and that they used materials that a high school student would have access to. For me, this makes competing at a science fair tangible instead of an impossible dream, because my students don’t come from a wealthy or privileged background and this doesn’t have to stop them from becoming science pioneers. I was also surprised that students used the correct type of statistical tests, because when I asked why they used a t-test or ANOVA, they were able to explain their reasoning behind it. It did, however, add a new daunting layer to the work I am about to start at South, but I have always loved statistics and can use this as a learning opportunity to prepare them for a career in science - with the technology we have in 2020, it won’t be very difficult. I was surprised also that the students presenting their projects had new ways to improve their work, if given the opportunity to continue their research. I think this is the most powerful point of research: how can we take what we know about our work and make it better, cheaper, and faster.

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SHANNON JOHNSON
The first day we saw student posters I was absolutely stunned at the level these kids are presenting at. The posters included statistical testing, some included cost, some students had already received patents for their work, and it seemed as though they are operating at a college level, though none had actually graduated high school. I noticed some students were truly innovative, unique, charismatic, and personally invested in their work while others explained their work was based off the suggestion of the professor they worked for in a lab environment. I saw several projects that seemed to utilize biology, chemistry, engineering, and computer programming. It became apparent to me that the need for interdisciplinary science is absolutely necessary for this type of competition and I began thinking of who I can collaborate with in my building (specifically computer programmers). The other thing that became apparent as I saw more and more projects was that students must possess a kind of intrinsic motivation to operate at this level. The most passionate and knowledgeable students began their work as early as middle school. I began to think that I will definitely need to initiate a program that involves recruitment to seek out youngsters at the middle school level and nurture their scientific curiosity as well as recruit them to get them ready for this scale of competition.

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Partnerships varied a lot. Some students worked with only the people from their school, while others worked with a university.

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Katie Miller

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Katie Miller

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Learning Through Citizen Science (Part 2)

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Learning Through Citizen Science (Part 2)

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Katie Miller

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Learning Through Citizen Science (Part 1)

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Learning Through Citizen Science (Part 1)

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Katie Miller

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I think my biggest takeaway is that students need to have interest, the question must be relevant and meaningful to society, and the project must be self-driven.

With the population that I work with, I’ve noticed that my students need gratification for their work relatively frequently rather than once after several months of work. Something I would like to work on is putting together a Science Research course at Bryan High. I had the opportunity to speak with Tracy Rumbaugh and learned about how she runs her course at Central High (check out the notes below).

In terms of next steps, I’m going to select a few students who may be interested in completing an independent study course in student research. I will also try to gauge student interest to see if it will be possible to run a full section of the course. I will use what I learn from that experience to further refine the design of the course (using Tracy’s as a model), so it fits the needs of my students. Then, I’m going to propose the course to my building principal and curriculum specialist with the help/support of interested students.

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I think that one of the most important things when finding motivation for student research is tackling a problem or question that is relevant to the students and is interesting to them. One of the students I spoke with worked on developing a procedure for determining the concentration of lead in drinking water using spectrophotometry. I think a project like this would be super relevant to our students - especially considering the lead contamination in east Omaha and the current Flint water crisis. This project would be relevant to my students, but also it shows that we don’t necessarily need huge amounts of resources to give our students an opportunity to do science on their own. The student I spoke with conducted the experiment at his own home.

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A lot of these projects are super original! Before I came to this conference, I talked with one of my classes about attending to learn more about how to support student research and science fair projects. Immediately, one of my students asked if he could make a model volcano. I asked him what his question would be, and he said, “will it explode?” Something our students will need support in is asking scientific questions or identifying engineering problems that are high-level, but answerable.

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There is a wide range of “sophistication” in the projects. Last night, I saw one project where the student was using AI to determine how to minimize water use in plants while maximizing plant growth. This student wrote his own program with arduino to take pictures of the plants and analyze the pigments. I also spoke with another student who looked at how different light sources (led, fluorescent, etc.) affected plant growth. It was a much more simple design, but it was still an interesting and well-done project.

Another thing I noticed is that a key trait of these students is being driven and self-motivated. The student with the AI project I spoke to started learning how to program and was self-taught when he was in the fifth grade. For a science project to be successful, students have to be personally-invested and interested.

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The projects were very advanced and unfortunately at this point not something we could do in our facility.   However, I would like to push my students into more in depth topics for next year.

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I noticed some of the papers that were attached to the project poster.  That was incredible and some of them would take some time to read through.   I also noticed how complex some of the research topics were and would love to know how they came about picking that topic!

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It is hard for me to connect with these projects, but it does show me that if I want to get more in depth projects from my students I will need to partner up with a community partner.

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Molly Felten .                               I liked learning how the posters are formatted, how citations can be used in the abstract, and how they were all printed. I wondered how I could get my students to use PPT to create their projects. I would like to use PNP to print maybe? I took a lot of pictures to help explain different portions and show examples. I was curious about getting help learning how to program an Arduino. 

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Molly Felten .                               I liked learning how the posters are formatted, how citations can be used in the abstract, and how they were all printed. I wondered how I could get my students to use PPT to create their projects. I would like to use PNP to print maybe? I took a lot of pictures to help explain different portions and show examples. I was curious about getting help learning how to program an Arduino. 

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Molly Felten                        Many professors and universities partnered with students to do biological research.   

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Molly Felten                        Many professors and universities partnered with students to do biological research.   

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A lot of the partnerships had work done in a science lab.  They would have needed to make a connection with someone who could provide those necessary items.

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The in depth content of the projects.  At Blackburn we just started having a science fair maybe 3 years ago and we have not encountered a project even close to that caliber (but we are in the early stages.)  I know one of the things that hinders our students and really diving deep into a topic is materials and resources.  We just got a set (10) of ten laptop computers for our classrooms this year, before that if you were lucky enough to have computer in your room they were ancient and were on the verge of dying.  Our laptop cart that you had to check out had a handful of laptops and some that didn't work.  I would am amazed by the caliber and quality of the research projects that were presented.

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-          There were many projects that were based on student interests: toxicology of hair dyes, preservatives in foods, headphones & hearing loss.  Seeing the students passionate about all the aspects of work.