Science Fair Winners

On December 12, 2025, students from 7th and 8th grade participated in the Palm Beach Regional Science and Engineering Fair (PBRSEF) and many got outstanding scores. Out of the 9 students who participated, 3 of them advanced to the state and will be competing again in March. 

The Science Fair

The science fair process starts in the fall, when students pick a project and start working on it. They create poster boards explaining their projects, and then go to the fair and where judges walk around the area. When one stops by their booth, they have to be ready to explain their project and answer any questions asked by the judges. 17 students originally applied, but only 9 actually went to the fair. For the 3 students who advanced, they will continue to collect data for their projects, and create new boards to present at the state level in March. The 3 students who advanced were competing against 20 to 40 other students in their category, and they were the best in Palm Beach County. “We were very proud of all the kids who competed, because this was their first year for all of them,” Mr. Simmons, 8th grade Physical Science teacher and overseer of the science fair students at our school, said.

The Advancing Students

Three out of 9 students who participated in the science fair from our school advanced to the state level. These students were Stella Persek (8th), who got #1 place in the Physics category, Salahiddin (Salah) Sultanov (8th), who got #1 place in the Intelligent Machine Robotics and Systems Science category, and Luca Rogers (7th), who got best in show and #1 in the Chemistry category.

Stella Persek is an 8th grader at our school, and she won #1 place in the Physics category. Her project was on piezoelectrics, which is the application of mechanical force on a piezoelectric material, which then generates energy from that force. She mentioned that “One of my friends and I had an idea on a piece of technology that would only use a small amount of electricity, but you would be able to send little signals to each other.” Stella explained that her idea was to make the device into something wearable that only used the piezoelectrics, and since that is such a small amount of power to begin with, there wouldn’t have to be a battery stored in it. One idea that she had was to create a piece of jewelry that has a little device inside powered by piezoelectrics, that is connected to another piece of jewelry that someone else would have. These pieces would be able to send little signals, so say if you were in trouble somewhere, all you would have to do is activate the little device connected to another piece that your friend has, and they could come help you. It could also connect to your phone and send a signal to a satellite or emergency contact. Since it is piezoelectric, it doesn’t use too much energy and doesn’t have to be charged that often. 

Salahiddin (Salah) Sultanov is an 8th grader at our school, and he won #1 place in the Intelligent Machine Robotics and Systems Science category. His project was on the performance of the existing and previous nuclear missile defense systems. He explained that he was simulating how well nuclear offense systems work against incoming nuclear threats, and he would run simulations of each missile against an incoming ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile). Then, he would have the data recorded throughout the flight, output it, and would then have it read through and graphed to see the performance, success, failure rate, and accuracy. “I originally wanted to come up with my own nuclear defense, but after doing a lot of research, I found out there was a whole bunch of defense systems, so I decided to instead research that first and then work on my own defense later.” Salah said.

Luca Rogers is a 7th grader at our school, and got the award for Best in Show and #1 in the Chemistry category. His project was the ability of plant-derived antioxidants to inhibit reactive oxygen species in a pH-neutral solution. This means that in plants there are these compounds called polyphenols. They have the ability to absorb or inhibit these compounds known as reactive oxygen species, which are oxygen based compounds that are highly prone to bonding and reacting with other substances. His goal was to try to “simulate it in a pH neutral environment, such that it could be quite similar to conditions within the human body.” He explained. Luca did a lot of reading and research to think of his project, and at first wanted to do something with microbiology and yeast, but then realized he wanted to do a project that had more applications in the medical industry. Luca mentioned that he got a different outcome than he hypothesised, finding that different chemicals led to different results.

These students, as well as the others who competed, are creative, intelligent, and resilient, and we wish them best of luck competing in the state competition in March.