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Hi everyone, I teach high school in Burnaby, BC (yes, in Canada). A colleague of mine and I saw the exciting community that surrounds math competitions (ex. the Math League) and we wanted the same for science. We wanted to see a group of passionate science students staying after school to work over and discuss science challenges. So, we came up with the REAL Science Challenge - a series of contests that test science skill (analyzing data, drawing conclusions, interpreting trends) as opposed to science content. This year, our pilot year, we had 452 students from 12 schools in BC participate. In 2017-2018, we want to include more schools. We want to build a bigger, more passionate science community - in our own school and around those in our community (global or local). Attached is a copy of the first challenge students wrote this year. Please visit realsciencechallenge.com for more info and to sign up for regular updates regarding future challenges as well as a resource package. I would love to answer any questions you might have. Thanks for reading this far! Kent

Attachments

REAL_Science_Challenge_I_(2016-2017_TEST_ONLY).pdf (0.25 Mb)

Hi Chris and Sheila, thanks for your response! We would love to have your students participate. If you haven't done so already, please visit our website (realsciencechallenge.com) and subscribe to our email list. We'll keep you posted on updates and future dates as well as teaching resources (we're working on a resource package right now, and we'll continue to add more to the resource package along the way).

We are wrapping up our second year for the REAL Science Challenge contest. This past year, we continued developing passages and questions that test students' abilities to apply their science practices (ie. analysis, graph interpretation, drawing conclusions) and we learned quite a bit from our participants (for example, many struggle with identifying correctly what independent and dependent variables are). We had students from BC, Ontario, Ohio, Illinois, Oklahoma, and Korea participate this year. We have four contests written throughout the school year and one more contest coming up. Below, I've posted the first 2 contests written in the 2017-2018 season. If you have any questions about the contest or would like to get more information on it, please visit realsciencechallenge.com and see our contest information page.

Attachments

REAL_Science_Challenge_-_Vol_2_Contest_1_(Key_and_Analysis).pdf (0.03 Mb)

REAL_Science_Challenge_-_Vol_2_Challenge_1_(final).pdf (0.63 Mb)

REAL_Science_Challenge_Vol_2_Contest_2_(final).pdf (0.25 Mb)

REAL_Science_Challenge_Vol_2_Contest_2_Answer_Key_+_Analysis.pdf (0.03 Mb)

REAL_Science_Challenge_Vol_2_Contest_2_Data_Package.pdf (0.74 Mb)

We're back for another season of science contests - our REAL SC Contest Series Vol 3!

When we first started 2 years ago, our ultimate goal of for running a science contest was to create a passionate community of science students at our school (if you've ever seen the community surrounding math contests, you'll know what I mean). We hope to spread that passion and enthusiasm to other schools like your own by having your some of your students participate this school year.

Here are a few quick details:

• There are 4 contests throughout the year (the first being written in October).
• Last year, students from Canada, the US, and Korea participated in the contest series. Students placing in the top 10% overall received awards.
• The contests are all written at your school. There is no travel or marking involved. You email us back student response forms after each contest and we do the marking.
• The contests are a test of science skill (analyzing data, drawing conclusions, defending competing hypotheses) instead of science content.

Check out our contest dates page for contest dates this school year and our FAQs page if you have any questions.