Category: MSA Headlines

MSA Student Research is on a Roll!

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Congratulations to all student researchers who shared their work at the Tidewater Science and Engineering Fair!  Special recognition to the following students (an * indicates that, in addition to the category award, the student also earned a “special award”).  Click here to see a video montage from the event.

Tidewater Science & Engineering Fair Outcomes

Animal Sciences: Jenny Vu, 1st place

Behavioral and Social Sciences: Jae Cook, 2nd place; and Lena Rice, honorable mention

Computer Science: Austin Mao, 2nd place

Electrical Engineering: Will Bettis, 2nd place

Material Science and Biological Engineering: Zayd Hasan*, 1st place; Emma Johnson*, 3rd place

Environmental Management: Dylan Mach*, 1st place and Overall Award of Excellence

Medicine and Health: Ahana Dutta*, 1st place; Joshua Han, 2nd place; and Ava Mae Swafford, honorable mention

Physics and Astronomy: Mark Chernov, 1st place; Rockwell Li, 2nd place

Environmental Science: Meilin Ranjan*, 2nd place

Additionally, the following student papers have been accepted to the Virginia Junior Academy of Science Symposium:

Zayd Hasan, “Designing a Compact, Cost-Effective Bioprinting Platform”
Meilin Ranjan, “A Pollution Distribution Confusion: Socioeconomics of Microplastics Contamination in Virginia Beach, VA Waterways”
Canon Robins, “Sports Analytics: Using Multiple Regression to Predict the Outcomes NBA Games”
Reagan Labert and Iana Niknezhad, “Development of Novel RNA Therapeutics for Female Infertility”
Natalie Patton, “The Impact of Motivational Theories on Perceived Persuasion”
Congratulations to these student researchers, their expert scientists, and to Mrs. Shoemaker for a successful year of scientific and engineering inquiry!

The best outcome for our student research is for our students to share their work with the communities that could benefit from their findings.  Two of our student researchers are doing just that.

Meilin Ranjan will be sharing his work with HRSD and touring their facilities as a part of the special award he won.  He would like to invite a few juniors to attend with him if they are interested–see Mrs. Graves!
Dylan Mach contacted the City of Virginia Beach and was invited to share a 30-minute presentation on his work, gaining great feedback and valuable networking contacts. He was also invited to share his work with the Virginia Department of Health Public Health Grants team!  Way to go, Dylan!

After a Tough Year, Some Good News

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Let’s call the 2020-2021 school year what it was–it was hard!  That doesn’t mean good things weren’t happening.  We learned so many new skills, we focused our efforts on the essentials, and we practiced some agile thinking and problem-solving. Great things are happening for our graduates, too.  We are already hearing from our class of 2021 that their Academy foundation is helping them to build a successful undergraduate experience–from landing rare, undergraduate research/lab positions to being named to college advisory boards.

Beyond the awesome emails we are receiving from our graduates, we are hearing from university deans about our students’ success as researchers in college.  Most recently, we’ve received word from Dr. Keith Mellinger, Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Mary Washington, that Alexander Fernandez, MSA Class of 2018, presented at the UMW Jepson Summer Science Institute.  During the event, he shared his work, completed under Professor Lamphere in the biology department, titled “Morphological Changes in Non-Native Fish Species Influenced by Differences in Upstream and Downstream Habitats.”  Way to go, Alexander!  We remember when he presented his senior project at the planetarium and are so proud that his desire to learn, research, and publish his work to benefit others continues.

Beyond college, our students are emerging as field leaders–even in such crazy times as the past two years.  This past summer, we learned that the MSA’s very own Alex Stern was making headlines.  Click the image below to read more about the next step in his journey.  He’s accomplished so much since his senior project exploring how businesses use big data and data science–now he’s applying his talents in the NFL!

From Senior Project to a Bright Future!

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Many of you may have seen the recent Facebook post about Tunde Demuren–when he was a rising senior he completed his senior project using the Virginia Space Grant Consortium’s VASTS summer academy as his shadowing experience.  Now he is planning missions for NASA.  Learn more about his exciting work by clicking the image below.

Click the image to read the Harvard publication about Tunde’s work.

Tunde is one of many former MSA students who are still pursuing experiences, education, and career opportunities associated with their senior project focus. Here is an update from Sara Burtner, who will be interning this summer in NYC as a dance-health intern with the Joffrey Ballet School.

Both of these former students invested their time and energy into a senior project that made them proud, that taught them about a career field, and that was tied to their personal interests.  They are getting out of their education what they put in; their hard work is leading to uncommon success!  We see this same drive in our current rising seniors and know that they are headed to awesome senior projects and fabulous futures.

Among the Class of 2022, we already have Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair computational biology and bioinformatics winners–from the regional grand prize to a state first place, and finally winning fourth place internationally and a scholarship from Arizona State University–for their work titled “Application of Deep Learning in Target Identification Through Determining the Mechanism of Action Given Cellular Signature Data.”  Congratulations to Ayush J. and Omar A-H! The Class of 2022 is also excited for Alex T. who participated in some medical projects and, as a result, delivered a presentation to the National Cardiology Congress and participated in a case presentation that was recently accepted for publication!

Click the image to see the full case study.

 

We can’t wait to see what the summer holds for the Class of 2022!

Dolphins Making Waves at the Tidewater Science and Engineering Fair

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Like with most things during virtual life, work, and school happening right now, student research has been difficult this year.  Despite all of the limitations, shutdowns, and setbacks of this year, many of our students managed to explore topics of personal interest and conduct an experimental design or engineering design project, sharing their findings at the 70th annual Tidewater Science and Engineering Fair.

In fact, Ocean Lakes High School will be representing our region at the Virginia State Science and Engineering Fair, where the four first-place winners listed below will be sharing their work.  The first-place and second-place Grand Prize winners will also be representing our school, region, and state, at the International Science and Engineering Fair!  If you are interested in learning more about any of these projects, click on the image below to access the students’ project portfolios and the four first-place project presentations!

Events like TSEF couldn’t happen without the support of our students’ expert scientists and our own, much loved, Mrs. Babette Shoemaker.  Thank you for sharing your expertise to help these students engage in these topics and produce quality work.

Click on the image to access more information about each project.

Discovering dOLpHinS–Mentors for Freshmen

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We are so proud of this year’s seniors for their flexibility and agile thinking.  Rather than shadowing professionals this year, seniors completed thorough literature reviews into topics associated with professions of personal interest.  As the school year begins, they are considering how they can use what they’ve learned to benefit others.  Three seniors are framing this year’s circumstances as an opportunity to improve our school community.

To help our incoming freshmen transition well into the virtual high school environment, Sarah S., Amanda W., and Lauren W. have organized a freshmen mentoring program, Discovering dOLpHinS,  through which seniors will host weekly virtual meetings with a small group of freshmen with the goal of connecting to fellow dolphins with similar interests and providing high school transitioning support.

If you are a freshman, or the parent of a freshman, check out the interest form linked to the image below.

 

Click on the image to access the interest form.

 

MSA student results TSEF

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The Math and Science Academy submitted 27 projects to the Tidewater Science Fair on March 3, 2018. We had a great day and the results are below.  Way to go DOLPHINS.

Tidewater Science and Engineering Fair Results – March 3, 2018

Animal Sciences:

1st Place – David G. (senior)

Behavioral Sciences:

2nd Place – Angelica E. (senior)

Honorable Mention – Abhir K. and Sai S. (sophomores)

Biochemistry:

3rd Place – Pierce C. (sophomore)

Honorable Mention – Tianyu W. (senior)

Cellular & Molecular Biology

Honorable Mention – Janna A. (senior)

Computer Science:

2nd Place – Yoland G., Dylan W., Chance P. (freshman)

Honorable Mention – Yusuf C. (sophomore)

Engineering: Electrical and Mechanical:

Honorable Mention – Devin H. (senior)

Honorable Mention – Kristof S. (junior)

Energy and Transportation:

1st Place – Cole B. (senior)

Environmental Sciences:

Honorable Mention – Pandora L. (senior)

Mathematics:

3rd Place – Will S. (senior)

Honorable Mention – Alex P. (senior)

Medicine & Health Sciences:

1st Place – Alan M. (freshman)

Plant Sciences:

1st Place – Jacob B. (senior)

27 projects – 16 honorable mentions or higher, 4 1st place awards and 7 special awards.  😊 We look forward to taking a group of these young scientists to STATES.