Students Show Their Smarts at the Southwestern Academy Science Fair

Southwestern Academy’s annual Science Fair gives clever students a chance to shine. The December Science Fair featured various projects from students such as making egg shell geodes, finding the best acne medication, determining how climate and weather affect the sweetness of a watermelon, and much more.

Students had the chance to participate in two categories; experimental or a Rube Goldberg competition. Experimental projects challenge students to come up with their own projects and test their hypothesis by using the Scientific Method.

The Rube Goldberg Competition challenges students to use six different types of simple machines to complete a task. This year’s task wasto turn on a dispenser hand sanitizer from a pump bottle.

Southwestern Academy’s Physics teacher, Ms. Lauren Brunjes,who oversees the Science Fair each year, explained that these projects take a lot of planning and thought behind them.

“The real world benefit of a science fair is really to get students to learn how to plan, how to follow through, and how to present their findings. This covers all aspects of life, not just science. Most importantly I think it teaches them how to work together,” said Lauren Brunjes.

Southwestern Academy is located at 2800 Monterey Road in San Marino. Call (626) 799-5010 or visit www.southwesternacademy.edu for more details.