A trip to the Guam Science Expo

On May 8th all the winners of the CNMI Islandwide Science Fair went to Guam to represent the CNMI. PSS was kind enough to pay the way for 18 students and several chaperones and coordinators. I went to represent the Life Science category. I think everyone was nervous because Guam has so many more students. I know I was because I kept forgetting my display board. I left it on the plane and in the airport in Guam.

We all stayed at the Fiesta Resort and Spa Guam. After we got there we had to go set up our displays at the University of Guam. I got even more nervous when I saw all the other experiments. I liked one student who was trying to find out if playing different types of music affects the growth of plants. I had heard that talking to your plants can help them grow better. My dad says he thinks that when you talk to them, you notice if they have bugs, or need water. So it’s the attention, not the talking, he says. I once read about an experiment where some monks sat around their gardens “directing positive energy” at the plants every day and these gardens grew much better and even tasted better! Who knows? The student reached the conclusion that plants grew better “listening” to classical music, but didn’t grow well with hard rock music. Hmmm.

Another interesting project was a fourth grade boy who wanted his dad to stop smoking so he forced cigarette smoke into cotton balls in jars. The smoke left the cotton yellowish-brown. Non-filtered cigarettes were way worse. His dad says he’ll stop smoking now. I hope so.

After setting up our projects, we went—you guessed it—shopping! I shopped ‘til I dropped.

So the next day, we got up early to go to UOG for the judging. Now I was really nervous. It got worse when my dad got lost and we were almost late. Then came the waiting. And more waiting. And after that we waited some more. The judging was supposed to start at 8am, but I didn’t get judged until 10:30am. We couldn’t leave the room and all adults, except the judges, had to leave the room. This did not help my nerves.

I was a little disappointed when the three judges finally got to me. My dad and I had gone over and over every question they might ask me. But when they got to me they asked me to just read my project to them and then they moved on to the next student. No questions! I was kind of relieved but I felt like I wasted my time preparing. I think they should ask questions to see if you really know your project and to see if you can add anything else to what the display says. Since I did the project months ago, I had some new information on how to control the terrible ivy gourd vine that is smothering our forests. If we’re going to be more self-reliant on Saipan, we’ll have to grow more of our own food like the Young Farmers Club at SVES. To do this we’re going to have to control that vine! Oh well.

So after they judged me they said we could go but to come back and see if I placed in the top 3 for my division. If you do, you get judged again and you can win a trip to the NASA-sponsored Space Camp. I had mixed feelings about that. Most of me wanted to advance, but part of me was getting tired of this project. I had already been judged and won twice, at SVES and the CNMI science fairs. Besides, I could hear the shopping malls calling me. We ate lunch and went back for the results. I got fifth in my division, so we headed for K-Mart.

Two of the CNMI students made the finals and both their projects have something to do with self-reliance for the CNMI. Allyssa Arangorin, a ninth-grader from Kagman High, placed first in the Energy, Inventions, Electronics and Photography category. Her project was “A Conventional Way of Filtering Rain Water.” She had DEQ check her rain water before and after running it through her special filter. They certified that while you wouldn’t want to drink the rain water before her filtering, it was very safe after the filtering. This could really save us money in the CNMI. We wouldn’t have to buy drinking water all the time.

Patrick Agustin, a fifth grader from GTC Elementary School, placed second in the Physical Science category. He was trying to find out “which type of generator is more useful, wind or hydro-electric?” His conclusion was that hydro-electric was more useful. While we can’t build dams here in the CNMI, we sure could use some windmills to generate energy. Then we wouldn’t have to buy and burn oil to get power. Patrick told me the trip to Guam was “lots of fun!”

I agree with Patrick. It was so fun! I want to thank PSS for sponsoring us and promoting science. I think teachers should spend more time teaching us with hands-on science projects. It gets the students more interested and helps us understand more than just reading books and answering questions. We’re going to need scientists more than ever in the CNMI. [I][B](Vanessa Gramlich)[/B]

Vanessa Gramlich is a fifth grade student at the San Vicente Elementary School.[/I]