DC Science Fair Judge

I really enjoyed this experience. The kids were so smart and talented. Hearing about their projects was amazing. I asked to stay in the loop for DCSTEM volunteering opportunities.

On March 16, 2024, I participated in the STEM fair at Dunbar High School as a volunteer, among my Howard University peers. The day began precisely at 10:30 a.m., with a full orientation outlining our roles and duties for the event. For the first three hours, I was assigned a position in the greeting section, where our major responsibility was to warmly greet arriving students, parents, and community members. Guiding them through the check-in and security procedures.

Following our time at the greeting section, my fellow volunteers and I were tasked to hand out participation certificates to the students. Partnering up, we moved through the venue, presenting certificates while also taking the opportunity to admire the diverse array of projects on display. It was truly inspiring to witness the creativity and ingenuity showcased by the students, each project offering a glimpse into the exciting possibilities within the realm of STEM education. As the event came to an end, we joined together with all participants to help with the cleanup, ensuring that the venue was left in good condition. Overall, I can certainly state that my attendance at the STEM fair was both rewarding and pleasant.

My experience as a judge was wonderful. I got to view kids' science experiments about social media, color recognition, product designs, and more. All of the projects I viewed were insightful. My service portion was online as the projects were sent to me and I filled out the judging forms through an online platform, Google Docs. I will attach some of the projects I viewed.

I had the opportunity to participate in an exciting and enriching event of the DC Science Fair Judge at Dunbar High School. This event was aimed to bring together the bright minds of the youth and their innovation. Together with the other volunteers we helped the staff with different tasks such as greeting the participants and their parents and directing them to the check-in table, giving out participation certificates, and finally helping with the clean ups.

The first responsibility I had was greeting the participants with their parents at the gate. This task was pretty simple and self-explanatory, all I had to do was to greet the participants, their parents and onlookers that came with their children or alone to attend the event. I also directed them to the table where they can check-in if they already registered or register if they did not. In addition, I also helped lost and confused participants locate the entrance since there were many doors to enter from. One of the volunteers and I alternated this responsibility until it was time to give certificates.

The next thing that I did was hand out participation certificates for the participants. This task was divided into two groups, the first one was for elementary schools and the second one for secondary schools. Then each group was further divided into pairs. Then after each pair took a portion of the certificates and some ribbons to give to each of the participants. This is when I had the opportunity to observe the wonderful works of the students. Every project was different in its own aspect. Some of them were related to biology and environmental biology. Lastly after we finished handing out the certificates the closing ceremony was held. After which we helped clean up the tables and the space.

I had the amazing opportunity to judge the DC Science Fair- Engineering submissions. We had numerous submissions from different schools in DC. And all of these people were so intelligent and passionate that they got amazing scores. We selected winners for each middle school and high school student. The judging was done way before the day of the fair. On the day of the fair, I actively volunteered for the entire event starting from helping the organizers to set things up, unpacking the snacks, helping students set up and settle down, and everything and everywhere the organizers needed us(all the Howard volunteers). Watching these kids present such amazing projects really reminded me of my school days. This one time I had made soap out of goat fat with my science teacher. It was such an amazing experience just to make something and talk about it. One of the high school students had even done machine learning and everything so early which was really impressive. This was a great opportunity to see where our future leaders or innovators are up to. To have the privilege to judge their projects was something I will always be proud of. Thank you so much for this opportunity.