This story was submitted by Harker parent Maria Gong (Christopher, grade 6).
On March 3, the EagleBots team, comprising grade 6 students Andrew Chang, Christopher Gong, Kaushik Shivakumar and Rithvik Panchapakesan, secured the top spot in the robot performance category of the NorCal First Lego League (FLL) Silicon Valley Championship, held at Newark High School. The EagleBots earned first place in the robot performance category by securing 455 points in a field of 48 teams from six district qualifier tournaments. The EagleBots’ focus on robot performance has been recognized by their achievements over the past two years at the St. Lawrence qualifier where they secured the top spot in the robot performance category this season and second place last year, as a rookie team.
Team StormTech, a second group of grade 6 students made up of Ryan Adolf, Ayush Pancholy, Akshay Ravoor, Ashwin Reddy and Anjay Saklecha, also had an amazing season competing for their first time in FLL. At the NorCal Championships, they were awarded the second place trophy for strategy and innovation and their robot finished fourth overall in the robot game with an impressive 418 points. Their research project, “Invizalift: The Motorized Knee Brace” received praise from the judges. Throughout the season they worked hard and had fun.
In February, several members of the Harker chapter of the Triple Helix, an international organization that publishes scientific articles by university students, headed to England to attend this year’s Triple Helix conference at Cambridge University. Harker journalism has the full story. Harker became the first high school to charter a chapter of the Triple Helix in 2011.
The semifinalists, all grade 12, are Paulomi Bhattacharya (“A Novel AAA-ATPase p97/VCP Inhibitor Lead for Multiple Myeloma by Fragment-Based Drug Design: A Computational Binding Model and NMR/SPR-Based Validation”), Deniz Celik (“Computation of the Cell Phone-Induced SAR Distribution in a 3D Multi-Layered Model of the Human Head/Brain using Finite Element Analysis”), Jenny Chen (“RNAi of Rec12 in Schizosaccharomyces pombe: The Effect of Meiotic Recombination Inhibition on Fungicide Resistance”), who performed all of her research at Harker, Andrew Luo (“The Kinematics of Andromeda’s Diffuse Ionized Gas Disk”), Payal Modi (“Understanding the Chemical Inhomogeneities in Globular Clusters: Examining M4 and M5 for Trends in Elemental Abundances”) and Ashvin Swaminathan (“Surreal Analysis: An Analogue of Real Analysis for Surreal Numbers”).
A total of 26 students submitted projects for this year’s contest, each student spending countless hours doing research, writing and refining in preparation, with much help and encouragement from their mentor teachers in Harker’s science department.
“We could not be more proud that our students were recognized for the culminating efforts of their entire research process,” said Jennifer Gargano, assistant head of school for academic affairs. “The process reflects so much of who we strive to be – our students putting forth great efforts to deeply learn about and understand a topic they are truly interested in.”
The semifinalists each received a $1,000 prize and a chance to head to Washington, D.C., for the final stages of the contest, the winner of which will receive $100,000. More information about the semifinalists will appear on Society for Science’s Facebook page in the coming weeks. The finalists will be announced Jan. 23.
In early November, this year’s Siemens Competition regional finalists gave presentations of their research to Harker students and faculty in the Nichols Hall auditorium. Ashvin Swaminathan, Paulomi Bhattacharya and Rohan Chandra, all grade 12, and Zareen Choudhury, grade 11, each gave presentations on the projects that they would be presenting at the regional finals later in the month.
After the presentations concluded, each student took questions from the audience concerning the findings shared in the presentations and the methodology used to reach their conclusions.
The Siemens Foundation announced today this year’s semifinalists and regional finalists in the Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology. Ten Harker students, four finalists and six semifinalists, were among the students named. Harker students submitted a total of 24 group and individual projects for the contest. One third of the finalists from California are Harker students. They are: Ashvin Swaminathan (individual), Paulomi Bhattacharya (individual), Rohan Chandra (individual), all grade 12, and Zareen Choudhury (group), grade 11. This year’s semifinalists are: Andrew Luo (individual), Kevin Susai (individual) and Ravi Tadinada (group), all grade 12, Anika Gupta (group) and Saachi Jain (group), both grade 11, and Andrew Zhang (group), grade 10. Each of the regional finalists were awarded $1,000.
All of the students spent many hours doing advanced research and analysis for the projects they submitted for the contest, which has thousands of entrants every year.
Four Harker students were recently named semifinalists in the 2012 Broadcom Math, Applied Science, Technology and Engineering as Rising Stars (MASTERS) competition. Rishabh Chandra, Jonathan Ma and Rajiv Sancheti, all grade 9, and Venkat Sankar, grade 8, were four of 300 middle school students chosen from nearly 1,500 nationwide entries.
Broadcom MASTERS is a science fair competition in which middle school students enter science and engineering projects at fairs affiliated with the Society for Science and the Public. If their projects are nominated at these fairs, they then submit applications to describe their interests and related careers they are considering. A panel of scientists and engineers then selects the 300 national semifinalists.
On March 7, some of Harker’s middle school and upper school students competed in the Synopsys Championship, a regional competition that showcases achievements in math and science. Harker has been competing in the Synopsys Championship for years in both the junior (grades 6-8) and senior (grades 9-12) categories. The competition draws hundreds of students from all types of schools, and awards and prizes are given in many areas.
In the competition, students work both independently and in teams to answer questions in many areas, including computer science, environmental science, medicine and health, chemistry and biology.
Chris Spenner, an upper school physics and science teacher, said that, “Harker students arrive at Synopsys along a variety of avenues: the research class, the Open Lab program, the Harker-arranged summer internships, and direct mentorship by Harker faculty. A few students pursue research independently of Harker programs.” To qualify, “students completed an application form which was reviewed for procedural safety, ethics and minimum quality standards by Synopsys volunteers. The fair is open to all projects in the sciences and engineering,” Spenner said.
The middle school students performed admirably at the fair. Anika Mohindra, grade 8, won the second award in the botany category, while Sneha Bhetanabhotla, grade 7, took home the first award in the physics category as well as second place for grades 6-8 for the Vacuum Coaters Society. Kristin Ko, grade 8, won the second place award for grades 6-8 for the American Society of Civil Engineers. Rishabh Chandra, grade 8, and Jonathan Ma, grade 8, took first award for the physics category, for their joint project. Both Avi Khemani, grade 7, and Manan Shah, also grade 7, brought home an honorable mention for the environmental sciences category for their project. Michael Zhao, grade 8, took the second award for his project in biochemistry/microbiology. Finally for the middle school, Venkat Sankar, grade 7, took home the first award in the botany category.
The upper school students also performed very well, with 27 students earning awards. Sriram Somosundaram, grade 9, took the first award for the biochemistry/microbiology category, as well as winning first place for the Inez M. Lechner award. Prag Batra, grade 12, took home an honorable mention in the med-immune category as well as a grade 12 individual project award. Stephanie Chen and Kristine Lin took home the second award in the chemistry category for their joint project, while Paulomi Bhattacharya and Eesha Khare, both grade 11, took home awards for outstanding sustainability as well as an honorable mention in the chemistry category for their project. Vikas Bhetanabhotla, grade 10, took home the first award in the physics category. Lucy Cheng, grade 12, took home the first award in the Earth/space sciences category, while Emily Chu, grade 11, and Payal Modi, also grade 11, took home the second award in the environmental sciences category. Another successful joint project was developed by Christopher Fu and Matthew Huang, grade 10 and grade 9 respectively, and it took home an honorable mention award in the physics category. Anika Gupta, grade 10, won the first award in the environmental sciences category. Another upper school student, Rishabh Jain, grade 9, received a second award in the computers/mathematics category. Saachi Jain, grade 10, also took home an award – the first award in the chemistry category.
Revanth Kosaraju, grade 12, took home two awards: an honorable mention in med-immune as well as a first award for biochemistry/microbiology. Neil Movva, grade 9, received first place for the Inez M. Lechner Award. Suchita Nety, grade 11, also placed, and was awarded the second award in the chemistry category. Anika Ridiya-Dixit, grade 11, received a prestigious award – a certificate of achievement from the United States Army for her project in the areas of medicine/health. Upper school student Tara Rezvani, grade 11, took home the first award in the behavioral/social areas. Vikram Sundar, grade 10, won the second award in the bioinformatics category. Vedant Thayagaraj, grade 9, was awarded second in the medicine/health/gerontology category. Sarina Vij, grade 11, also took home an award as a finalist in the Synopsys Outreach Foundation prize. Also at the fair, Albert Wu, grade 12, was awarded first in the bioinformatics category. Finally for the upper school, Stanley Xie, grade 9, took home an honorable mention in the medicine/health/gerontology category, while Samyukta Yagati, also grade 9, was awarded first in the computers/mathematics category.
The middle school Science Bowl team, Rishabh Chandra, Jonathan Ma and Michael Zhao, all grade 8, and Aneesh Samineni and David Zhu, grade 7, took fifth place at nationals at the end of April.
The team won the regional Science Bowl competition held at NASA AMES research center on March 3, earning an invitation to the national competition in Washington, D.C. – the middle school’s first exposure to the Science Bowl national competition.
Forty-four teams, all regional winners, took part in the finals. The Harker team did an excellent job in the round robin tournament, handsomely beating all six teams in their bracket. This led to double-elimination where Harker defeated two teams in a row, but unfortunately lost their third and fourth matches, including one to Hopkins who has finished in the top three for the last three years and went on to win the national championship title again this year.
The results put Harker fifth in the entire country, and earned the school a tidy $1,000 in award money. B.J. Hathaway, of Harker’s BEST program, chaperoned the trip in place of coach Vandana Kadam, who could not attend the nationals due to a schedule conflict.
“In addition to the academic part of the competition, National Science Bowl requires students to make a car using a lithium ion battery,” said Kadam. “Our team constructed the car based on the specifications before heading to D.C. Harker took fifth here, too, covering 20 meters in 7.05 seconds. Great job, gentlemen – congratulations!”
Harker teams swept the TEAMS (Tests of Engineering Aptitude, Mathematics and Science) National Finals for 2012 in both grades 9-10 and grades 11-12 categories. The 2012 challenge had students working on engineering problems involving health care and medicine. Harker’s grade 11-12 team accumulated 156 out of a possible 176 points, finishing just a few points ahead of the second, third and fourth place teams. In the Level 9-10 bracket, Harker edged the second place team by a single point with 138 points. Read more about the exciting April preliminary results.
TEAMS is an annual high school competition challenging students to work collaboratively, applying math and science knowledge in practical, creative ways to solve real engineering problems. Focused on a theme each year, original academic and innovative concepts are developed for the competition based on the National Academy of Engineering’s Grand Challenges. The challenges require job-readiness skills such as teamwork, analytical thinking and multidimensional problem-solving.
Harker swept both “Best Of” titles at the Test of Engineering, Aptitude, Math & Science (TEAMS) competition at Stanford on Saturday . More than 60 Harker upper school students, freshman through seniors, participated in the annual event. Nationally, more than 14,000 high school students, working in groups of four to eight, spent the day solving problems on real-world engineering issues such as air transportation, bridge design and rehabilitation, flood analysis, solar-powered vehicles, food preservation and more. The competition, broken into two 90-minutes parts, consisted of objective multiple-choice questions related to various engineering situations followed by students describing and defending their solutions from Part I.
Part I answers are scored on competition day and are used to determine local and state standings, as well as eligibility for national scoring. Based on Part I results, Harker swept the two top spots: Best in California grades 9/10 division (20 teams competed) and Best in California grades 11/12 division (34 teams competed). Part II responses are scored at TEAMS for national ranking, which comes out in May.
“Congratulations to all participants!” said Tony Silk, Harker’s TEAMS advisor. The division 9/10 Best in California team, all sophomores, comprisedStephanie Chen, Albert Chu, Jennifer Dai, Chris Fu, Rahul Sridhar, Vikram Sundar, Claudia Tischler and Andy Wang.
The division 11/12 Best in California team, all seniors, comprised Lucy Cheng, Alexander Hsu, Revanth Kosaraju, Ramya Rangan (captain), Pavitra Rengarajan, Katie Siegel, Ananth Subramaniam and Patrick Yang.