Science beyond the classroom

Serena Bettis • November 21, 2015

20151121_221138-1 — The AP Chemistry textbook. Photo Credit: Serena Bettis

Within five short years, the Fossil Ridge High School Science Olympiad team has grown tremendously. Started in 2011 by Ms. Vigil (and later co-sponsored by Mr. Dannahower), the team went from placing seventeenth at the regionals competition their first year, to winning both the regional and state competitions in 2014 and receiving second in state in this year. With over twenty events involving STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) topics, Science Olympiad is the next step in enhancing a student’s scientific educational background.

Based on national regulations, Fossil’s Science Olympiad is split into four teams, with about fifteen students on each. Two or three students from each team are involved in a single event (a single student has about three events) and compete together after months of preparation. In order for students to learn and practice their event, teachers, parents, and subject experts volunteer to coach these students about once a week for five or six months during the school year.

Topics span all forms of science, including astronomy, anatomy, chemistry, archaeology, biology, robot building, and ecological sustainability. Different events have different requirements, whether they are that the students take a test to demonstrate their wide range of knowledge on a subject, perform a lab, or build or demonstrate their already built model, such as a wind turbine, within a designated amount of time. The need for an in-depth knowledge of specific science fields requires students to spend countless hours learning about and studying for their events. The skills they gain go far beyond the reach of a typical high school science course.

One event, Chem Lab, covers AP Chemistry ideas, even though many FRHS participants in this particular event are freshmen who are just now taking General Chemistry. Because of this, the work that students put in assists them in their academic lives, broadening their knowledge and giving them the skills they need to be successful in science classes. It also shows them real-world application of scientific ideas, allowing them to discuss big ideas with college professors and get a look at careers they want to pursue in the future.

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Natalie Spencer, an avid member, said “It has helped me discover so many things that I would never have learned in class and inspired me to choose a career in science – something that I would never have considered beforehand.” Spencer has extensive Anatomy knowledge due to her seven years of involvement in Science Olympiad. “Everyone that does Science Olympiad is committed to learning – it’s an awesome place to make friends with the same passion for science” said Spencer.

The regional competition will take place on March 5, 2016 and the state competition is at Colorado School of Mines on April 16, 2016. Anyone is welcome to join, even if they have not taken many science classes at FRHS or been involved with in the club before.

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About the Contributor

Serena Bettis, Editor-in-Chief

Serena Bettis, senior, is entering into her third year on the Etched in Stone staff as this year’s Editor-in-Chief. A four year journalism student, she has high hopes for Etched in Stone this school year, and wants to be able to guide the staff in achieving their goals as much as possible. While Bettis has become a much more outspoken person than she was when she started at Fossil Ridge High School, she still finds discomfort speaking in front of large groups of people (“large” being defined anywhere from 6 to 30), but is more than ready to grow in that aspect of leadership over the course of the year. Most of her journalistic goals for the year are not personal, but rather involve the entire program. She aims to further improve upon the look of the Etched in Stone website, which she spent countless hours on her junior year, enough for it to win awards before she graduates.

Aside from Etched in Stone, Bettis takes part in the school marching, jazz, and concert bands as a flute player, volunteers with Key Club, and is the Historian for the National Honor Society. She has also held a part-time job at TCBY for over a year, and now knows more than she needs to about the sugar content in frozen yogurt. In her spare time, which is often hard to come by, Bettis can be found reading for fun, lamenting about how none of the new Young Adult romance novels she used to love so much are good anymore, working on making the perfect French macaron, or binge watching her recent addiction, Game of Thrones. Music is a large part of her life, and her favorite genre is difficult to describe because she listens to many different bands. Some of her favorites include twenty one pilots, All Time Low, and Halsey, more alternative bands such as Issues and SWMRS, pop artists including Carly Rae Jepsen (“she’s so much more than “Call Me Maybe””), and Little Mix, and various songs by Spanish singers.

She is more than ready for graduation, and aspires to be attending college in Chicago by this time next year. Bettis knows that she wants to double major in journalism and foreign languages, with a potential minor in music, though she is undecided on what specific occupation she wants after college. Her best advice to someone who does not know what they are interested in is to simply join different activities and see what happens from there. “Eventually, sometime during sophomore year, journalism became the only class I wanted to go to, and even now I love it more than I used to love band, so that’s when it hit me that this was what I wanted to be involved in for most of my life,” she said. Another somewhat undecided goal of hers is to join the Peace Corps either during or after college, and she hopes that an experience in a different country with complete strangers might help her figure out what exactly she wants to do with her life.