Nazareth has Strong Showing at Regional Science Olympiad

and high school students won medals in nine events Wednesday at the annual Central/Eastern Pennsylvania Regional Science Olympiad at Kutztown University.

Celia Szuba, an eighth grade science teacher and head coach of the Science Olympiad team, said she thought the results were fantastic.

“We can only have 15 members on a team and out of those, nine students were rookies this year,” Szuba said. “Everyone did a great job. The learning that takes place from this type of competition is so valuable.”

The students, who are in grades seven to nine, competed in 23 events. All of the Science Olympiad veterans -- five are in and one is in middle school -- placed in the competition. The veterans have an asterisk beside their names.

The medalists for this year’s competition and their events include:

First Place

• Crime Busters – Madison Davis* (ninth grade) and Michelle Jani
• Forestry – Michelle Jani and Kelly Sarkis* (ninth grade)
• Mousetrap Vehicle – Brad Fox and Robert Adams

Second Place

• Microbe Mission – Mihikaa Garg* (ninth grade) and Madison Davis* (ninth grade)
• Road Scholar – Kelly Sarkis* (ninth grade) and Chris Lichner

Third Place

• Reach for the Stars – Jake Strow and Brad Fox

Fourth Place

• Awesome Aquifer – Chris Lichner and Matthew Porter* (eighth grade)
• Food Science – Carolina Braga* (ninth grade) and Meaghan Kelly* (ninth grade)
• Storm the Castle – Sarah Kunkel and Allyson Stitzer

In 2011, the and won a spot in the at Juniata College. NAMS was one of five schools to attend states from this region, Szuba said.

The Science Olympiad organization had fewer schools participating in the 2012 competition, due to PSSA testing this week, Szuba said. For this reason, it chose to send only four schools to the state competition. Nazareth didn’t make states, she said.

Nazareth Area High School also participated in the Science Olympiad competition, winning third place in protein modeling.