Budding scientist wins big

On September 3, Orewa College student Jennifer Palmer became the first secondary student, and the first female, to win the Premier Award at the prestigious Eureka competition.Jennifer featured in Hibiscus Matters’ August 19 edition when she made the finals of the competition – one of six college students and six university undergraduates to do so. At the time she said that winning would be a long shot, but she was keen to share her enthusiasm for synthetic biology with the judging panel.

She says abandoning her notes part way through and speaking impromptu worked well. Judges commented on her in-depth knowledge of her topic, synthetic biology, which helped her answer probing questions.

The competition has run since 2012 and has in the past been won by university students. Jennifer says she still can’t believe she won and is excited by the networking possibilities and contact with scientists that have opened up.

She will put her $10,000 prize towards studying neuroscience at Otago.

Science fair success

Local students were awarded with a bundle of prizes at the annual North Harbour Science & Technology Fair. The event attracted 132 entries from Year 7–10 students. Nine schools from the North Shore, Hibiscus Coast and Rodney entered their students’ best science projects.

Whangaparaoa College Year 8 student Alex Jones, conducted research into the most effective way to wash your hands, concluding that good old soap and water was preferable to hand sanitiser. She received the Standley Jober Cup for the most outstanding log book.

Orewa College winners at the science fair included Alex de Beer, who won the NZ Statistical Association award and Hamish Greenwood who won a Gold medal in the Living World category.