Three young scientists from Happy Valley Middle School will soon be sharing their theories with other students at a regional science fair competition.
HVMS recently held a science fair at the school, and science teacher Robin Taylor said the top three placing students will be going on to compete at a regional science fair to be held at East Tennessee State University on April 9.
At the HVMS fair, Gracyn Carder captured first place, Hannah Monroe took second place honors, and Maggie Howland earned third place.
“They did a really great job,” Taylor said of her students.
Each of the students was allowed to select a topic for their competition entry. The students then had to develop a theory and then find a way to put their theory to a test and document the results.
Carder titled her project “The Race to Evaporation.”
“I took four different liquids and then a mixture of two liquids to see which would evaporate the fastest,” Carder said.
Based on her treat results, Carder said of the liquids she tested acetone evaporated the fastest.
Monroe chose to test the ability of different heat conductors in her project, which she called “Too Cold, Too Hot, or Just Right?”
“I took five different metals to see which one would conduct heat the fastest,” Monroe said.
Based on her results, Monroe said copper was a fast conductor of heat, while iron proved to conduct hear at a slower rate.
For her project, Howland took a more colorful approach by testing the ability of different colors to absorb heat.
“I did color temperature,” Howland said. “Basically, color changes temperature by absorbing heat.”
Howland used the colors yellow, green, red and black and, based on her test results, determined that the color black absorbed more heat and absorbed heat quicker than the other colors.
Carder, Monroe, and Howland are no strangers to competition.
“We went to ETSU last year,” Monroe said.
All three of the girls said they are excited to be headed back to the regional science fair to compete.