Island students demonstrate what they've learned at provincial science fair

More than 200 Island students filled the Chi-Wan Young Sports Centre at UPEI in Charlottetown on Wednesday to show off their projects as part of the P.E.I. Science Fair.

The day-long event featured 155 projects by students in grades 4 to 12.

The participants, representing 27 schools around the Island, explored topics and concepts including biodegradable plastics, new uses for sea lettuce and electroplating.

Cohen Redmond, a Grade 5 student from Stratford Elementary School, was eager to pass on what he had learned from his project on beekeeping.

"Stay calm and hope that they won't sting you," Cohen said. He spent the year working with bees, and had to insulate the bee box to make sure the insects would survive the winter. He even got to sample the honey during his project.

"This is my first time ever going to provincials out of my whole family so that's kind of cool."

Grade 8 students Jessee Hill and Ardyn Hardy at Summerside Intermediate School decided to create their own biodegradable plastic cups. They were inspired to see what they could do after watching a documentary on plastic in the ocean.

"We decided to make three different types of biodegradable plastic to show … multiple and different options for petroleum based plastics," said Hardy.

Making changes for the environment

Some of the methods they used were unsuccessful, but Hill said it was part of the learning process.

"We just thought it would be easier, like once we made the plastic it would just become a cup," Hill said.

"But there was a lot of it not drying in time and part of it cracking and some of the recipes we had to use less of this and more of that and a lot of different things we had to change about it to make it better."

Avery Nicholson, a Grade 10 student at Bluefield High School, tried to find a practical use for sea lettuce in river ways.

She and a classmate had worked on the project for nearly a year, collecting samples from the river using kayaks. In the end, they still had questions about their extraction methods.

Scientific method to possible solutions

"Every step was something to learn from and there is so little research done with this product, especially with the extraction of this product," said Nicholson. "So even though the supercritical experiments didn't work the way that we had wanted them to, it is important to know so then we can figure out which one is the best."

Nicholson said that she plans to continue researching her project and encourages others to follow their science fair passions.

"Definitely go for it and work hard," Nicholson said. "If you are passionate about it then it will not seem like a bunch of work, more so just fun and you are just learning about things you want to know about."

There were around 80 different judges talking with the kids and inspecting the projects to hand out a variety of awards and prizes in the afternoon.

Five students in grades 7-12 were chosen to represent the province in the Canada-Wide Science Fair that will be held in Fredericton, N.B., May 15-17.

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