ORANGE — Ralph C. Mahar Regional School held one of its semiannual science fairs this week, with projects explaining everything from ice melt corrosion, to sleep’s effect on mood, to the impact of the meat and dairy industries.

Chemistry teacher Barbara Schulze, who also serves as science department coordinator, explained all honors science classes are required to participate with an experiment, research or model. Thursday’s fair consisted of 22 projects, with most of them completed by groups of two or three students.

“There were some very impressive ones,” Schulze said during a break from judging in the Eileen M. Perkins Library & Media Center.

There were 12 judges, working in four groups of three. After the fair concluded at around 3 p.m., Schulze announced that Laura McGinnis won first place (and a tie-dye lab coat) in the experiment category by creating her own hand warmers.

“It was not an easy thing to do,” Schulze said. “She persevered. She was on the verge of giving up but she didn’t.”

Xander Dowler and Noah Rich took second place in the experiment category with their experiment about rockets’ altitude, and Jeff LaPlante and Noah Bailey came away with third place for their ice melt corrosion test.

Arianna Canning and Frankie Chiodo won first place in the model category by building rockets, and “Electroplating vs. Electrolysis” earned Noah Rumrill and Owen Carl second place in that category.

Parker Doyle and Ian Hardy claimed first place in the research category with their work on the effects of the meat and dairy industry.

“I’m vegan and I’ve been very passionate about this for a long time and, basically, I just wanted to kind of inform people of where their food is coming from and what … effects they have on the environment,” Ian explained. “We’ve been told that our speaking is good. We’ve also been told that they like how … we were able to condense so much information.”

Parker, a pescatarian, said research indicates eating fewer animals is beneficial to the health of people and the planet.

“It really showed that just having a more plant-based diet is better for … your body and your health,” she said. “And not supporting these kinds of industries can really help the environment.”

Gavin Sullivan took second place in the research category with his sports-specific research into cardiac arrest due to sudden trauma. He incorporated the case of NFL player Damar Hamlin, the Buffalo Bills safety who went into cardiac arrest and was twice resuscitated following a tackle in a game on Jan. 2. In the same category, Brendan Gruszkowski earned third place for researching causes of lightning.

Senior Sophia Woods, who Schulze said won last year’s winter and spring science fairs, served as a judge on Thursday.

“I love it. I love getting the opportunity to see every experiment because when I was a participant I didn’t get to see any experiments,” she said during the fair. “But when I am a judge I get to ask questions, I get to see everything about the entire experiment, so it’s very interesting and I’m very thankful for this opportunity.

“This year is actually going very well,” she continued. “A lot of kids have come up with new experiments that I’ve never seen before and a lot kids have been building off previous experiments that I’ve seen in the past. So it’s very interesting to see how they take that and manipulate it in their own way.”

Reach Domenic Poli at: dpoli@recorder.com or
413-930-4120.

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