Huong, 15, competes on the Golden Gate Science Olympiad in Air Trajectory, which requires a construct that makes use of the gravitational potential power of a falling weight to launch a ping pong ball at a bucket a ways away. She is the one woman in a crew with three older male teammates.
Huong says she has discovered a lot from them, particularly making use of physics and math idea to their builds. At first, nonetheless, “it was strolling right into a room with guys and their hammers and drills doing all of the engineering, like women aren’t meant for this,” she says. “However then I went dwelling and designed the load system that we now use. Fixing the issue that males are speculated to do motivated me.”
Huong is a member of the Milpitas Excessive Faculty Science Olympiad group outdoors of San Jose, California. It was based in 2008 by Letta Meyer, the college’s AP chemistry and forensics instructor. Meyer had heard in regards to the competitors together with considered one of her college students, and so they determined to begin up a group from scratch. Since then, greater than 300 college students have been Milpitas Excessive Science Olympians.
Science Olympiad is an extracurricular science, know-how, engineering and math (STEM) competitors involving some 7,800 excessive and center faculty groups throughout america. Tournaments are organized like observe meets, the place a group of as much as 15 college students compete, largely in pairs, throughout 23 science occasions like Astronomy, Microbe Mission, Flight, Codebusters and Robotic Tour. These occasions are written exams, bodily labs, engineered builds and hybrid actions combining these totally different components. The competitions are solely a small a part of the general exercise, as group members spend a mean of between six and 10 hours per week all year long finding out, soldering, prototyping, logging, catalyzing, memorizing, establishing, programming, analyzing or no matter it takes to reach their occasions.
One in every of Meyer’s goals with the group is to draw extra women into STEM. A primary-generation school graduate, she remembers roadblocks to women rising up within the Nineties, like being urged to prioritize getting married and having children over searching for schooling. She was good at math and was planning to review accounting like her older sister. Then she took a common science class for non-majors. There, seeing an indication of igniting hydrogen and oxygen in a balloon to kind water led to a fascination with science that she continues to share together with her college students at present.
In 2023, noting the persistent underrepresentation of ladies in STEM fields general, particularly engineering and know-how, Meyer printed a case examine on the influence of Science Olympiad on feminine group members’ STEM id as her doctoral dissertation on the College of San Francisco. She discovered that collaborating in this type of program, which is extra collaborative than aggressive, permits women “a protected house to develop STEM id and private particular STEM pursuits.”
These pictures comply with the Milpitas Excessive Faculty group via the 2024 Science Olympiad season, with a deal with feminine college students. Their photographs, views and experiences contact on numerous observations Meyer makes in her dissertation as key to sustaining younger ladies’s sense of belonging in STEM, together with:
- participation in a protected house the place perfection will not be anticipated
- help for exploring areas outdoors of 1’s consolation zone
- women and boys collaborating in a group of teammates, companions and function fashions
- rising competence resulting in deeper curiosity and inside motivation
- confidence and competitors readying college students for the skin STEM world.
The Milpitas Excessive Faculty Science Olympiad group’s season led to March, when it got here in fifth within the Santa Clara County Regionals, lacking qualification for NorCal State Finals by one place. Monta Vista Excessive (Cupertino), the group that received Regionals, went on to win NorCal, and on the finish of Might received the fortieth Annual Science Olympiad Nationwide Match at Michigan State College.
Brianna, 14, and Darren, 16, arrange for Scrambler, the place the power from a falling mass drives an egg-laden automobile as near a barrier as potential with out cracking the eggshell.
Earlier than center faculty, Brianna by no means thought of science; she was into princesses and unicorns. She was bored by a programming course her software program engineer father made her take, and didn’t like the concept of finding out for aggressive exams outdoors of college. She did take pleasure in making issues — clay, portray, origami — so on this 12 months’s group she grew to become generally known as the freshman woman who does builds: Flight, Tower and Scrambler.
“In Sci Oly, you and your associate are by yourself, hands-on, no instructor,” she says. “It’s all of the take a look at runs and failed trials that make you higher. YOLO, proper?”
For Tower, Saga, 15, and her associate Sukhad, 18, construct a wooden and glue construction required to be no less than 60 centimeters tall and capable of span a 20 by 20 centimeter opening. Factors are awarded by dividing the load the tower can bear (sand in a bucket suspended by a sequence) by the load of the tower itself. Utilizing light-weight balsa, their greatest tower weighed simply 6.2 grams and held over the utmost 15 kilograms of sand. Over three months of testing and competing within the 2024 season, the pair constructed and destroyed 15 towers.
Saga says, “I had by no means been extraordinarily aggressive. However after I was a freshman, at one match in Forestry, we ended up simply 0.5 factors from sixth place, which is the place the medals begin. That was it. We began finding out like loopy. And the following competitors we bought third.”
An, 17, research together with her associate, Roman, 17, for Illness Detectives, the place opponents apply epidemiology rules to come back to conclusions about real-life outbreaks and different public well being conditions. She compares being a part of Science Olympiad to her expertise on the college swim group.
“I’m one of many quicker women, so I usually prepare with the fellows,” she says. “For a very long time, they acted like I didn’t need to swim with them. I used to be on the sting. I felt I needed to show myself.”
The Science Olympiad group, alternatively, is a “protected, completely satisfied, welcoming place,” she says, the place she has labored properly with male teammates, together with a three-year partnership with Roman in a number of occasions. “Collaboration makes me extra assured.”
Isabella (proper), 14, and Vanessa (left), 16, compete in Forensics on the Golden Gate Science Olympiad on the College of California, Berkeley.
Along with Science Olympiad, Isabella additionally competes in basketball, volleyball and observe.
“In sports activities, guys have the organic benefit,” she says. “They’re stronger and quicker. However intelligence isn’t based mostly on gender. I wish to present the world I’m simply as good as any man. Take a look at Dr. Meyer. She’s so educated. If she’s in STEM, I may be in STEM, too.”
When Vanessa joined the group final 12 months, her first feeling was, “oh, these are the good individuals.” She doesn’t see herself as a aggressive particular person, however as a relative latecomer to Sci Oly, she was wanting to meet up with her teammates. “They’re elite, but additionally all the way down to earth, overcoming the identical struggles. So I believe, possibly sooner or later I will probably be like that.”
She says her father and mom was “tiger mother and father,” strictly managing her and her youthful sister to fulfill excessive expectations for tutorial success. Going into COVID-19 lockdown simply after shifting from Taiwan to the U.S. 5 years in the past, nonetheless, modified issues. “Spending quite a lot of time collectively, we found out one another’s boundaries.”
Vanessa’s father, a software program engineer, has an optimistic sensible viewpoint. She says, “He needs me to enter STEM. He says I’ll have a better time getting a job as a result of firms are beginning to search for extra ladies.”
Meyer’s AP chemistry classroom additionally serves because the Milpitas Excessive Faculty Science Olympiad headquarters. She loves educating however sees Sci Oly as a chance for college students to discover and compete.
In her dissertation, she discusses analysis about women’ conditioned aversion to competitors as a roadblock to success in STEM. She provides, “If there’s no competitors, there’s no cause to push additional. With out stress, there’s no drive. With an excessive amount of, although, it’s paralyzing, and we see impostor syndrome, like they don’t belong. So there’s a candy spot that’s totally different for various women.”
As a Milpitas freshman, Annabelle, 19, wasn’t conversant in Science Olympiad, however she was fascinated with marine biology and the group “had the phrase ‘science’ in it,” she says. She began as considered one of two women amongst 15 older boys in Detector Constructing, the place college students engineer digital sensor gadgets. “I bought to see the STEM hole in actual life. The blokes gathered collectively and left us out. That have steered me away from electronics,” she says.
She felt a greater slot in lab and take a look at occasions, the place extra women had been concerned than within the builds. However then she added Bridge (much like Tower however emphasizing size over top) as a junior. She noticed an older feminine scholar succeeding there, so she felt much less intimidated, and medalled in numerous competitions.
In 2022, she was named a senior captain on a group that reached NorCal State Finals. “Dr. Meyer ready us to diversify and make everybody really feel included. We determined to encourage extra women to take part within the builds, to indicate that they’ll do very properly and likewise assist males discover ways to collaborate with females,” Annabelle says.
Bridge pushed Annabelle out of her consolation zone and, together with a rising curiosity in environmental sustainability, made her determine to main in civil engineering on the College of California, Berkeley, the place she can also be studying to machine and weld components for a a lot bigger construction as a part of the college’s Metal Bridge Workforce. In engineering, she feels ladies usually should be extra extroverted and aggressive to be heard. However she says, “I’m glad I made this alternative.”
Brianna, 14 and Darren, 16, apply with their rubber band-powered, mylar-winged airplane for the Flight occasion, the place groups place larger the longer their plane stays aloft.
Meyer sits close by, however the college students cowl nearly the entire design, planning and selections. They don’t get to apply a lot as a result of Flight requires a giant indoor house, and the fitness center is normally in use by the sports activities groups.
The companions determined to work collectively on each Flight and Scrambler as a result of every of them might take cost of constructing one factor: Brianna the aircraft and Darren the automobile. He says, “I’m most fascinated with everybody having an equal quantity of accountability. Sure there’s systemic sexism, however I’m not gender. I simply wish to see what my teammates can do.”
Trophies the group has received in competitions get stashed in numerous corners of Meyer’s chemistry classroom, together with the laboratory fume hood. This displays the way in which college students view the awards: within the second, they affirm their skills, serving as further confidence boosters and a way of measuring effort and accomplishment. Ultimately, nonetheless, they change into a minor a part of the group expertise. Saga says “The enjoyment of medalling lasts about quarter-hour, however the entire thing is a lot enjoyable.”
Between occasions on the Santa Clara County Regionals, group members put together, eat, do homework, relaxation and socialize. Brianna jumps over the desk whereas Vanessa (going through digicam) has lunch whereas chatting with a teammate.
Vanessa says, “We bond over science, and that turns into friendship. Being partnered with males begins out otherwise than with females. It’s a bit awkward, a bit extra formal. The turning level is after we’ve taken one official take a look at collectively. Once we come out, we simply really feel reduction and all the strain is gone. We take a look at one another and say ‘It’s over. Let’s go eat.’”
On the Santa Clara County Regionals (which had been hosted this March by Milpitas Excessive), Meyer grabs a fast chunk on the group desk, run by mum or dad volunteers supporting the scholars. There are 40 highschool and 27 center faculty groups within the competitors. Milpitas has 60 college students current: three groups plus alternates.
An and Roman apply situations for Optics, the place they use mirrors to information a laser beam via a box-field of obstacles.
Ananya, 16, reveals gadgets she engineered together with her companions for Detector Constructing and Robotic Tour. She enjoys the hands-on method to particular issues. She additionally enjoys improvising options. Discussing their Detector, an digital probe that measures focus and voltage of salt options, she says, “At Regionals we had one minute to do the final studying. However the piece of zinc that goes into the answer got here unsoldered from the wire, so the response wasn’t taking place and we had been sort of screwed. Then I informed my associate to place his finger in there to finish the circuit and it labored. We even medalled!”
Working with circuits has overlapped in different pursuits, akin to constructing an electrical guitar to play in her indy band. She sees quite a lot of similarities as a lady in music and STEM: “It’s OK to be improper. Everybody’s on the identical footing. It’s OK to take up house — converse up and be heard.”
Ava, 18, and her associate Andrew, 17, look ahead to the start of Chem Lab on the Santa Clara County Regionals, the place they in the end took first place within the occasion.
When Ava began highschool, she didn’t take into account herself a science or math particular person — she was a inventive author. She joined Sci Oly as a result of Meyer was beforehand her piano instructor and “she was all the time speaking in regards to the group.” This 12 months she served as considered one of three senior captains. She nonetheless writes — long-form journey and fantasy — however after 4 years on the group, she says, “you understand you’re additionally a STEM particular person, utilizing a broad, very highly effective span of data that covers a couple of self-discipline.”
Thomas Russell Center Faculty is considered one of two center faculties that feed into Milpitas Excessive — their Science Olympiad group wears inexperienced group shirts as a substitute of the blue of the older college students. Center faculty is a vital place for younger individuals to begin moving into STEM, however highschool is the place it actually begins to lock in for many.
The group takes a selfie collectively throughout the awards ceremony on the finish of Santa Clara County Regionals. Lots of the college students say the group appears like a close-knit household. In Meyer’s dissertation, she notes constitution buses as an essential, underrated merchandise within the funds, as a result of the lengthy rides to competitions assist bond the teammates as a group.
After the season led to a fifth place end, Meyer says, “I informed them that outcomes — good or dangerous — don’t outline us. It’s how we carry out over your complete season. And it’s not like issues finish. We’re internet hosting an elementary match and selecting new captains. A variety of them are already speaking about what they wish to do subsequent 12 months.”
Brianna, 14, reveals medals she received in Flight and Tower on the Santa Clara County Regionals as her mom, Liya Yang, takes a photograph. Yang, a biology lab lecturer on the College of California, Berkeley, feels that pursuing particular analysis left her personal profession path very slender, so she is glad that Brianna is getting wider, extra sensible expertise in Science Olympiad.
In a Zoom interview, Yang says she would love her daughter to review drugs, however Yang’s husband is pushing for engineering. Yang says, “Engineering is a male subject. I’m unsure how comfy she will probably be.”
Off-screen, Brianna’s voice cuts in: “I will probably be tremendous!” ⚡
