March 2, 2015
Despite the Ice and Snow, Science Olympiad Ignites Young Minds for STEM Careers
On Saturday, February 21st, 2015, the Center for STEM Education hosted the annual Science Olympiad Tournament for northeastern North Carolina middle and high school students. North Carolina Science Olympiad is a nonprofit organization with the mission to attract and retain the pool of K-12 students entering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) degrees and careers in North Carolina. These tournaments are rigorous academic interscholastic competitions that consist of a series of different hands-on, interactive, challenging and inquiry-based events that are well balanced between the various disciplines of biology, earth science, environmental science, chemistry, physics, engineering and technology. Notwithstanding the icy weather, this year we hosted 426 students (209 middle school & 217 high school) from 25 schools in the northeast region. There were also over 150 volunteers involved in the day’s activities from overseeing events/competitions, to managing registration. Faculty and students of the MSITE Department were well represented. Drs. Carmen Woodhall and Liz Doster were event leaders for Simple and Compound Machines, while Ms. Tammy Lee and a plethora of her Elementary Science students created and ran the competition for Experimental Design. Ms. Bonnie Glass was the event leader for It Matters, where students display their knowledge of the properties and behaviors of different states of matter. Dr. Rhea Miles represented the MSITE Department by promoting program and certificate opportunities to the in-service teachers/team coaches and future MSITE students. The staff of the Center for STEM Education was the backbone of the tournament: Nancy Evans and Cheryl Miller, Allison Everett (photographer) and all the student workers at the Center! AWESOME job everyone!!! It was truly a remarkable day for STEM!