Grahamstown school pupils knocked the socks of judges at the Eskom Expo for Young Scientists International Science Fair held in Johannesburg last week.
Grahamstown school pupils knocked the socks of judges at the Eskom Expo for Young Scientists International Science Fair held in Johannesburg last week.
Entering 10 projects, they returned with eight medals and two category prizes. Diocesan School for Girls Grade 9s Jamie Brockwell and Sabrina Long walked off with a gold medal for their project investigating the best and cheapest method of water purification for aid organisations, governments and municipalities to invest in.
Their research concluded that the LifeStraw was the best product to use in areas where drinking water is contaminated or a clean drinking water supply is unreliable.
The pair was also awarded the Best Project: Health Care and Sports Sciences, a prize awarded to the project with the highest score in its relevant category.
Ntsika Senior Secondary School Grade 11 Ntsikelelo Charles was awarded a silver medal and the SAEON Best Project: Environmental Management prize for his project titled 'Investigating cheap, accessible and non-harmful ways to recycle grey water for crop irrigation'.
Other results were as follows: Silver – Callan Johnson (DSG), Amy Lovemore (DSG), Stuart Thomas and Cobus van Zyl (Kingswood College); Bronze – Jessica Ferreira and Nicole McCarthy (DSG), Lauren James (Victoria Girls' High School) and Nicole Oyentunji (VGHS).
The Eskom Expo for Young Scientists is South Africa’s national science fair that affords learners the opportunity to enter a project to exhibit their own scientific investigations. The Expo aims to inspire and develop young scientists who are able to identify problems, analyse information, find solutions and communicate their findings effectively.
Participants from Grahamstown were first required to enter a project into the Rhodes University/ Eskom Expo for Young Scientists.
This was one of 28 regional finals held in July this year, where their projects were selected for entry to the national finals on 27 and 28 September.
Scifest Africa and Grahamstown Regional Science Fair Director, Anja Fourie, said the performance by Grahamstown’s young scientists was the best yet for the region at the national final.
“The learners spent countless hours over eight weeks with their parents, teachers and our office upgrading their projects, and their hard work has paid off," she said. "Grahamstown is very proud of them, and they have every reason to be very proud of themselves. I hope these learners will be an inspiration to others in their schools to enter the competition and to access the opportunities it has to offer.”
