You Be the Judge

This has been my third year volunteering as a school science fair judge. The first time was because a teacher friend of mine asked me, but now every year I'm the one asking, "Can I do it again?" far in advance of when anyone at her school has considered circulating the request.

Science fairs make me smile. Though I've joined the ranks of "grown up" scientists, I like to point out to my colleagues that these fairs never stop. They just change the name to make them sound more professional: "conferences". Seeing kids standing in front of their carefully designed display boards, wringing their hands as they wait for the judges, hearing them recount their adventures with excitement and fielding our questions ... I can't help but picture these kids years from now in front of posters depicting their thesis research at an American Chemical Society conference. The words and concepts they use may get more technical, but the format remains the same. And hopefully the enthusiasm does, too.

Based on my experiences and advice from coordinators and other judges, I keep my strategy for interacting with the kids simple: promote curiosity, confidence, and fun. The actual time I spend with any one kid's project is less than 15 minutes, and I want the kid to do most of the talking, so having an effective "outreach" experience in this situation takes some strategy. But if you're looking for ideas, here's mine:



When the young scientist arrives, perhaps with her/his partner, I first introduce myself by first name and say that I am a scientist. No one has ever asked me for more information than that ... likely from shyness and also time limitations, but this is not about me or what I do anyway. I always shake their hands, hoping that on a subtle level they'll take this as some kind of sign of respect, one scientist to another. But really I also just want to give them a chance to get some confidence right away, flashing a smile and making my first question "What's your name?" which is usually an easy one to answer.

Next, I give them a chance to tell the story of their project. Usually they have something prepared to say, and sometimes it's written on adorable little notecards, and sometimes it's peppered with anecdotes like "And then Mom said I couldn't do the exploding soda experiment inside the house anymore". I love this part. But after that, it's time for me to perform. I have a chance to ask them questions or make some comments.

For my questions, if things are well explained, I'll usually ask them a question that gets them thinking about "the next experiment". Essentially, the main weakness I see in how science fair projects relate to what scientists really do is that they make out the scientific method to have a beginning, middle and end. Students report their projects in a format that mirrors this: justification/intro, methods and data, and then conclusions. But in reality, there usually is no end. You ask some questions, get some answers, but what you find ends up opening new questions. It's an advancing front into the unknown. And in my opinion, that's what makes science so cool.

So if my young scientist concludes that cheerios didn't lower her test subjects' cholesterol, I ask something like "Why do you think it didn't work? Based on your conclusion, what would be a good next question to consider? How would you test that?" These questions seem to go over well with the middle school set. Basically I put the kid in the position of being the expert, and they realize that they can put what they learned to use. And I promote that very important trait present in every would-be scientist: curiosity.

If I have any suggestions, I make them specific and constructive. And I always find a strength in their project and I point out how using that strength is important to being a good scientist. I will say, for example, "You did a very good job clearly explaining your project to me. Scientist have to be good explainers, whether they are sharing what they did with someone who could give them money to do their work, or when they are working with other scientists." Or, "You showed a lot of creativity when you two came up with these different steps in this Rube Goldberg machine. Do you think scientists also need to be very creative? Yes they do! A lot of the problems in this world are very complicated, so scientists need creativity to come up with solutions to them."

Perhaps before they thought they were dabbling students on a lark, but now? Future scientists. Hopefully this builds another thing important to encouraging a budding scientist: confidence.

And what about fun? I keep it light, positive, non-scary. I make sure I show that I'm enjoying hearing and thinking about what they learned. Perhaps they'll get the hint that, yep, I'm a scientist and I really enjoy it. I encourage them to participate again next year. So actually, I'm probably less of a judge and more of a cheerleader. Rah rah goooooo science! But I'm ok with that. Again, it's not about me. It's about them.

And hopefully after their exciting day is over they will weigh the whole experience, the pros and the cons, and judge for themselves that science is cool.