This article appears in the September 2024 issue of Front Vision, an educational Chinese-language magazine for kids. It is reproduced here with permission.
Science Competitions: Why you should enter and how you can win
by Kathryn Hulick
“You walk alongside booths and you can hear people having these rapid-fire conversations with judges or with their peers. You hear words you’ve never heard of. It’s buzzing with noise–just a swath of suits and words and terms and boards, figures and data. It’s really exciting.” – Shriya Bhat
Welcome to the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF), the world’s largest science competition for high school students. Out of the tens of millions of students who enter science fairs around the world each year, just 1,800 qualify to participate in this one.
Shriya Bhat not only attended this elite competition—she won! In both 2022 and 2023, she got first place in the Microbiology category. “I was super shocked,” she says. “I thought I had done a really great job and I presented my science well… but I was not expecting that.” At the time, she was a student at Plano East Senior High School in Texas. Now, she attends Harvard University where she’s studying molecular biology and planning on a career that includes scientific research.
ISEF and other science competitions help curious kids become successful scientists. Dianne Newman is a microbiologist who attended ISEF back in 1987 and 1988. She told Science News Explores that this was “a totally formative experience that changed my life. It gave me a taste of how much fun research can be, and how much joy there is to be able to share your research with others.” She says the competition helped her realize that she could have a successful career as a scientist – which is exactly what she went on to do.
Even people who don’t plan on becoming scientists learn a lot from science fairs. Participation teaches you how to plan and manage a long-term project, how to solve problems, how to work with peers and mentors, and how to communicate your ideas to others. All of these skills are useful no matter what career you end up choosing. Bhat says that these competitions foster “confidence and independence.”
Choosing a project
Ideally, working on a science fair project doesn’t feel like a chore. You should feel enthusiastic about the experiment you’re pursuing and motivated to find answers to your scientific questions. Real passion for a field of science is something judges look for. Newman said, “Try to find a project that stimulates you. That you’re genuinely curious about. And then, push yourself to explore it as rigorously as you can.”
Bhat agrees that you should choose a project that you feel motivated to work on. “A good foundation is figuring out what general field you really enjoy asking questions in,” she says. That might be machine learning, plant science, physics and astronomy, or any one of the 22 categories ISEF divides projects into. Pretty much anything that interests you has potential to become a science fair project. Like music? You could do a project related to acoustics or bird song. Enjoy sports? You could look into sports medicine or sports technology.
Once you’re interested in a field, Bhat says, you should pay attention to what questions experts in the field are asking themselves. Those are questions you could be exploring, too. You can find out what’s happening in a field by reading recent scientific research papers—Google scholar is an excellent place to search for these materials. The discussion section of a paper usually includes questions that the study wasn’t able to address, as well as ideas for future research directions. You can also come across great ideas by listening to scientific podcasts about a field, watching online talks, or even attending lectures or conferences. The research Bhat does while developing an idea takes up about 30% of the total time she spends on a project, she estimates.
Research papers can be intimidating – they are filled with technical jargon that can be very difficult to understand when you’re new to science. Bhat’s approach was to read the abstract first, then the introduction, and then look at the figures. High school students today, she says, have a big advantage. “There are these really helpful AI tools,” she says. Students can use ChatGPT or Claude or another bot to summarize a research paper, define new terms, or explain sections of a paper in a way that’s easier to understand.
“These tools aren’t perfect,” Bhat says. They sometimes get things wrong. But as long as you think critically while using them, they can help make tricky science more accessible.
Even before Shriya Bhat came up with her science fair project ideas, she knew she was interested in microbiology. While she was learning about the field on her own, she watched a TED talk titled “How bacteria ‘talk.’” It was about bacterial communities called biofilms that have a sort of chemical language that they use to coordinate their behavior. Bhat remembers thinking, “wow, that is so fascinating.”
Biofilms are a big problem in several types of disease, including the lung disease cystic fibrosis. This disease causes a sticky mucus in the lungs, a type of environment where biofilms thrive. So many people with this disease end up with recurring lung infections that don’t respond to regular antibiotics. Bacteria living in a biofilm can be 10 to 1,000 times more resistant to typical antibiotics than bacteria that aren’t part of such a community. Bhat wondered if messing with the chemical language might help people destroy biofilms. So over the next few years, her projects explored “whether we can break this communication.”
Once you’ve found a project idea that seems interesting, you should ask yourself a series of questions to make sure it is a good choice:
- How can this experiment make a difference? Your project should have the potential to contribute to science or society in a valuable way.
- Who is already doing this type of research and what have they discovered? You don’t want to repeat something that someone else has already done. Look for ways to expand on the work of others. Make sure you think about what the expected outcomes of your experiment will be. This will become your hypothesis.
- How difficult will the experiment be? Be honest with yourself about how hard it might be to understand and investigate your idea. If it is too expensive, too dangerous, too challenging, or will take a very long time, you might not be able to complete it. However, you also don’t want it to be too easy or it won’t impress the judges.
Finding mentors
In the real world, scientists almost never work alone. Most major scientific advances happen in very small increments as many different labs filled with researchers work diligently to solve a problem. Students working on science fair projects also need collaborators and supporters. A mentor is a special kind of supporter who has expertise in the field and can guide you as you develop your idea, perform your experiment, and analyze your results. You should identify a mentor early on in your science fair journey and should ask them for feedback at every stage of your project. However, it’s important that you are the one leading your project, performing experiments, and making all the decisions. Science fair judges look for evidence that your project is your own work.
High school teachers commonly act as mentors for budding scientists. Kelly Benoit-Bird is a marine biologist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute. She was the first person in her family to go to college. She told Science News Explores, “I didn’t come from a family background that understood research opportunities at all.” In high school, she started studying dolphins for fun. Her teachers encouraged her to pursue this passion, and she wound up competing in ISEF in 1994. “I was so fortunate to have some really strong mentors in my high-school biology and physics instructors,” she said. “ I think people in general are really excited to support students when they are following their passions.”
Bhat says that her biology teacher, Julie Baker, gave her the courage to ask questions about biofilms and do her own original experiments. “She was a tremendous resource,” says Bhat. She gave her students advice on how to conduct their experiments, but also on how to present their work so others would understand it and care about it, Bhat says.
Teachers aren’t the only people who can help with a science fair experiment, though. Bhat says that upperclassmen at her school really helped her out. They had experience participating in science fairs already. She also reached out to working scientists. Usually, their contact information is publicly available on their websites or in their research papers. (The “corresponding author” is the person responsible for answering questions about a scientific paper). “I was emailing professors all the time, asking for input,” she says. They didn’t always respond, but when they did, “I got some valuable insights,” she says. For a large part of her freshmen year, she did her lab work at a local community college. The lab belonged to a professor who was also studying biofilms.
You shouldn’t feel intimidated by the idea of contacting scientists, Raj Chetty told Science News Explores. He is an economist at Harvard University who participated in ISEF in 1997. At the time, he was studying cell biology. “It’s worth just reaching out to folks. I think lots of people want to help the next generation,” he said.
Conducting an experiment
Once you have a project idea and a mentor, it’s time to start experimenting… almost! Before you get out the test tubes, you should make a detailed research plan that follows the scientific method. Here are the most important sections to include:
- Rationale: a brief description of the problem you are investigating and why it matters.
- Research question: Explain your hypothesis. This includes the expected outcomes of your experiment.
- Procedures: Describe step-by-step how you plan to carry out your experiment. Include any equipment or tools that you will need.
- Risk and Safety: Identify any safety equipment you will need or precautions you will need to follow.
- Data Analysis: Explain how you plan to analyze your data or results.
- Bibliography: List all the research sources you used to develop your idea and research plan.
Bhat knew she was interested in biofilms and how to stop these communities of bacteria from communicating. Her rationale for her research was that it could help people with cystic fibrosis who are struggling with recurring lung infections that can’t be treated with typical antibiotics.
For one project, Bhat picked three substances that were each known to interfere with biofilm communication, also called quorum sensing. Each substance was a chemical compound that blocked communication between two different types of microbes. These compounds had all been approved by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) as non-toxic, so safe for use as medications. Her research question focused on finding out whether combining these compounds into a cocktail treatment might be more effective against biofilms than any of the substances alone.
Her procedures included analyzing the types of microbes often found in the lungs of people with cystic fibrosis and chronic infections. Then, she ran simulations that predicted how well the cocktail should work. Finally, she grew biofilms in a lab and tested the cocktail. “I tested various treatments of compounds at different time points, both as inhibitory and killing agents,” she explains.
During the experiment, Bhat needed to regularly check on the biofilms’ growth. At first, she did this using a technique called crystal violet staining. This would reveal how massive a biofilm was, but not how many of the bacteria inside were still alive. So later she switched to a technique that uses a dye called resazurin. Living cells change its color from blue to pink, so this dye can reveal how many living cells are inside a biofilm.
As you work on your plan, begin thinking about how you are going to get the materials you need. Many science experiments will require specialized tools and safety equipment. Bhat’s school provided some of the basic materials she needed, and the labs she worked in provided some equipment as well. But, she says, “I had to buy a lot of these materials myself.” You may need to fund-raise to collect money so you can afford to do your experiment. Bhat applied for school-level grants and got one that helped pay for her research. “I did have to support myself and really advocate for myself,” she says.
Also make sure to set aside enough time to do your experiment. “I did most of my research during the summer,” Bhat shared in a 2024 YouTube video she did with fellow ISEF winner Rishab Jain. He received a 2022 Regeneron Young Scientist Award and is now studying neuroscience at Harvard University. Bhat said she spent 7 to 8 hours per day in the lab every work day all summer long. Jain said he also mainly worked on his project over the summer and on school breaks. You have to think of the experiment as “a full time job,” he said. “You’re putting a lot of dedication into your research.” On a typical day in the lab, Bhat says, she was “growing bacterial cultures, isolating the biofilm, and adding combinations of treatments at optimal concentrations both after and before growth.”
No matter how much careful planning you do, things will come up during your experiment that you couldn’t anticipate. It’s important to be prepared to roll with changes and adjust as needed. For example, the Covid-19 pandemic hit during Bhat’s freshman year, and she lost her lab space at the local community college. She managed to find other places to continue her work. Another challenge for her involved switching to using the resazurin dye to help track biofilm growth. She had to learn new equipment and new methods. “It was not as straightforward as I expected,” she says. But she knew this method would be more accurate. “So I was motivated to make it work,” she says.
For her junior year ISEF experiment, Bhat tested a cocktail treatment that turned out to be 80% effective at stopping the growth of a biofilm that contained multiple types of bacteria. Her senior year experiment tested a different cocktail that targeted a biofilm containing the microbe P. aeruginosa. This treatment was 90% effective. So both cocktails show promise as possible new therapies for people with life-threatening diseases.
Jain points out that some students feel discouraged if their experiment doesn’t get excellent positive results. In the AI realm, he says, “when you come to ISEF, it seems like everyone has 99.9% results.” That means their idea worked almost 100% of the time. “You don’t need to have that top number,” he stresses. No matter what your results are, you can frame your research to show how it helps move science forwards. “70% accuracy may be more impressive for a specific project than 99.9% for some other project,” Jain explains. Even learning that your hypothesis was wrong could help move science forwards.
Wowing the judges
At the high level of ISEF, Bhat explains, “everyone is doing amazing work.” In order to stand out, you really need to wow the judges. ISEF judges award a maximum of 100 points divided up across five key areas. The research question receives up to 10 points. Here, judges are looking for a testable idea that contributes to your area of science. You should be able to state your research question in a clear, focused manner.
The category of design and methodology receives up to 15 points. This part of judging looks at the way you planned your experiment. Top points go to experiments that are well organized, with well-defined variables and controls, and excellent data collection methods.
A maximum of 20 points are awarded for execution, which includes data collection, analysis and interpretation. This part of judging looks at how you actually carried out your experiment. Your process should be careful and systematic—it should be straightforward for someone else to reproduce your experiment. It’s also essential that you collected enough data to support your conclusions and applied statistical methods appropriately.
Judges place special emphasis on the final two categories. Those are creativity (20 points available) and presentation (35 points). A creative project is original and inventive. You are trying something new and innovative that stands out from the crowd, or opens up new avenues of inquiry for further research.
The presentation category includes two parts: a visual poster worth 10 points and an interview with the judges worth 25 points. This category is especially important because an amazing discovery can only move science forwards if people know about it. Communicating the results of research in a clear and effective way is a key part of science, and essential to doing well in a science fair. Bhat had taken public speaking classes and had participated in speech and debate all through high school, so she was well prepared for presenting in front of the science fair judges.
Bhat finds enthusiasm to be an especially important part of a successful presentation. Every single time you present your work, she says, “bring that same energy.” Jain says his presentation style is a bit different. “How you present should be matching your personality,” he says. “My ‘wow’ factor is basically just being a nerd.” He says he knew so much about his field that he could really connect with the judges, even on topics beyond the scope of his project. And that’s important since the judges aren’t just looking at your current work, but at your future potential as a scientist. “They want to see that this award is going to encourage you to continue pursuing that passion,” says Bhat.
Clarity is also essential. If people don’t understand what you’re working on, says Bhat, you’ll lose your audience. She thinks it’s critical to break your ideas down to a level that “literally anyone could understand.” Keeping things brief can help with clarity. It’s also important to be brief with your presentation so that you leave time for questions. At ISEF, a judging interview takes 15 minutes. And judges don’t just want to listen, they want to talk with you. That’s why it’s called an interview. During the interview, you should be prepared to discuss your field in depth with experts. But also have fun and be yourself.
Diagrams, graphs, and images are another important part of an effective presentation. The poster, also called a board, explains your experiment and results. Bhat says she used “as many diagrams as possible” when designing her board, but really limited the number of words. Jain had a different approach. “I like to put as much information as possible to show that I did as much work as possible,” he says. As in the presentation, your board should reflect your personality—Bhat’s was pink and purple! Every board should have a visually pleasing design and should convey all the essential information about the project.
She thinks her choice of experimental topic helped her win first place. “There were not a lot of biofilm projects at the international level,” she says. “But it is a huge problem.” So her idea was creative and also had the potential to help society. She also thinks her level of independence in managing her project and advocating for herself mattered a lot. She says she showed the judges that she was not someone who “has had everything handed to her.”
Winning isn’t everything
Winning a science fair is an incredible achievement, and an excellent goal to aim for. However, science fairs are more about the journey than the destination. Along the way to that final moment of judging, you learn about yourself and your chosen field, you navigate challenges and opportunities, and you make connections with many amazing people.
Science isn’t about awards, but about learning new things that could help society. Bhat says, “You have to truly believe that the hard work you’ve done is making a difference.”
Newman said, “It’s a wonderful process to feel like you’re becoming a little bit of an expert in some small piece of the scientific world. It’s very fulfilling, and you have a lot that you gain from that no matter what. It’s really the process of the investigative design and the creativity that comes with doing a project that is the big win.”