Middle School Students Win Eight Awards at Regional Science Fair

On March 10, 2015, eleven students from Randolph-Macon Academy Middle School travelled to James Madison University to compete in the Shenandoah Valley Regional Science Fair. They pulled off a remarkable showing as six of the students brought home a total of eight awards.

•    "Tasting Color" by Julia Kolesnik ’20 won Silver in the category of Animal Science
•    “It’s Electric” by Pacey Gillum ’19 won Bronze in the category of Energy and Transportation
•    “Power Veggies” by Michael Sumner ’20 won Silver in the category of Energy and Transportation 
•    "You Kiss Your Mother with that Mouth" by Jonathan Bunker ’20 won Silver in the category of Medicine, Health & Nutrition
•    “Got Hops?” by Kota Ikemoto ’19 won Bronze in Physics & Astronomy

In addition to these placements, Carolyn Laourdakis ’19 (for her project “Arm Wrestling”), Kolesnick, and Sumner each received a Broadcom MASTERS (Math, Applied Science, Technology and Engineering Rising Stars) nomination. Broadcom MASTERS is a national middle school science and engineering fair competition. Science fairs affiliated with The Society for Science and the Public (SSP) may nominate the top 10% of sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students to enter the competition. Students must complete an online application following their nomination. Three hundred semifinalists will be selected, and 30 of those will be brought to Washington, DC to present their research projects and compete in team hands-on STEM challenges. 

Randolph-Macon Academy Middle School Principal Derrick Leasure is very proud of his students. “Our eight awards were impressive,” he commented. “We clearly did the best among private schools and among most of the public schools too.” 

The other students who attended the event earned their place by winning prizes in the Randolph-Macon Academy school-level science fair. Those students included Michael Ferguson ’21, Bernard Kasozi ’20, Noah Thirkill ’19, Joseph Correa ’19, and Ian Mounts ’19.