KEARNS - By following the light refracted by various concentrations of sugar water, Sydney Austin took home six awards from the 14th Annual Diocesan Science Fair, which was held at Saint Francis Xavier Regional School.
The top awards were given out almost back to back, and after the awards ceremony, the 8th-grader at J.E. Cosgriff Memorial School wasn't certain just what she'd won. For the record, she started her run with the 8th-grade physical science category, then went on to claim the Overall Eighth Grade Award, the Best Use of Mathematics Award, the Best Use of Oral Presentation Award, the Overall Physical Science Award and the Young Scientist of the Year Award, earning one ribbon, four trophies, a plaque and $600 in savings bonds.
Austin starting working on her experiment, "How Can I Predict and Measure Sugar Content in Water with a Laser Pointer Using Index of Refraction?," in October. "The hardest part was probably the mathematics involved," she said. "I had to get a ton of background information, then I had to learn the math" behind the different laws governing refraction.
She came up with the idea for the project after Internet research. "I wanted something that was really challenging and I wanted something with math involved," she said.
Austin, the third Cosgriff student in three years to take top honors at the science fair, credits teacher Jim Larson with her success in oral presentation.
Larson said he teaches both oral and written communication in his science class. "I stress to the students that communication of scientific thought is essential for acceptance of conclusions, and if they are unable to explain the results satisfactorily, the work will not be accepted as readily," he said.
Larson wasn't surprised by Austin's win, saying he thought the project was worthy of the top award because it was a very mathematically challenging project. He praised her perseverance, explaining that she stayed after school "on a number of different occasions to learn some mathematical skills that she hadn't really been exposed to yet."
Austin could have done the project simply by substituting numbers in a formula, but Larson pushed her to understand the mathematics. "It could have been a less challenging project had she just accepted the formula that she used, without trying to understand a little bit about the trigonometry behind it," he said.
Austin was one of the 200 students, some working in teams, who entered 186 projects in the science fair, making it one of the largest in the event's history, said Chuck Dover, past state deputy of the Utah State Knights of Columbus Council, which sponsored the fair.
see SCIENCE FAIR page 7
Stay Connected With Us