2004's Science Talent Search Winners Are In

Slate is running an article about this year's Science Talent Search (concentrating on things like whether the participants are "weirdos"); there are better descriptions of the top entrants' projects at this results page. Congratulations to the winners!

hmmm.

[LBArrettAnderson]

I wonder how many of them had help from their parents...

Awesome

[TheKidWho]

One of My friends was an Intel Semi Finalist, He worked on his project for about 6 months. Lucky guy now got into MIT.

Help from parents...

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember a PBS (Nova?) article about the
old Westinghouse science competition years
ago. The one thing that connected all the kids
was their PhD parents. Usually two.

Breeding will out.

-- ac at home (not my real name)

yeah but have those kids ever...

[ThomasFlip]

egged cars, or lit shit on people's door steps. As bright as these young people are, I think it's unfortunate that they have missed out on some of the more enjoyable things in their adolescents, especially the home schooled kids. If they truly enjoy it though, more power to them.

Insulting

[Anonymous Coward]

The Slate article is insulting. There is no other way to put it. The starting assumption that these kids would be so-called weirdos is silly, though perhaps unfounded. The stated "corollary" that "The more homegrown a young researcher, the more humdrum (by Intel standards) his or her enterprise--and the more exotic the kids' names, the more esoteric their topics" and the associated analysis of project titles is equally silly. Intel project titles are shaped by the conflicting influences of showing scientific merit (thus specific, and probably incomprehensible for people outside of the field of research, titles) versus appealing to a lay audience (such as the author of this article?).

The author later implies that these kids "may get short shrift from their popular peers" -- the standard "nerd" with no social skills stereotype. While, without a doubt, some of these kids fall into that mold, it is far from true for some, and in fact most, of them.

Lastly, the conclusion, in addition to perhaps being at odds with the earlier analysis of names, states that "the premium this year ... was on American ingenuity -- useful applications rather than elegant speculations." The story about the first prize winner's project, if anything, could perhaps reflect some politics in Intel's judging. The listed applications for the other projects are just that -- applications. When you do a theoretical project, you're forced into a position of "selling it." People will come up to you and ask you why what you did matters, and for the majority of them it will not suffice to extoll the value of intellectual development for its own sake. Very few STS finalists would be willing to say "this was just interesting theoretical work, with no immediate applications" (even if that is the complete truth). Am I devaluing their work? Absolutely not! I'm currently working on my mathematics degree, and I'm very much leaning towards pure math -- the more theoretical the better. If anything, I'd like to point out the viewpoint that "useful applications" are important is very dangerous. You can't always be looking at the short term, or significant advances won't happen.

Overall, the Slate article displays a certain viewpoint and tint that I find very distasteful (just look at the cartoon they chose to have accompany the article!).
With that, I'd like to congratulate the current crop of finalists. I hope they enjoy their time in the limelight, so to speak. It should be truly a wonderful experience. I personally know several of them and know that they most definitely deserve it.

Truth-in-commenting Addendum: I say the above as a former STS Top 10 awardee, so I'm not entirely impartial here ;)

Re:hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

Very few, if any, had substantial help from their parents in their research, which is clearly what you are insinuating.

I say this as a former STS Top 10 awardee, and as someone who personally knows several of this year's Top 10 awardees.

Re:hmmm.

[Meneudo]

I assume it all boils down to how much money these parents have, and who they know. I wish I had these kind of opportunities. But I'm stuck in a place where education is valued less than the size of your truck.

Re:hmmm.

[saden1]

I think it is the environment they are in more so than their parents directly helping them with the projects. One advantage all these kids seem to have is they have smart, loving, and nurturing parents (not that I said parents and not parent). I think we should all strive to provide that type of environment for our kids.

Re:Insulting

[QuasiEvil]

Insulting - that's probably the most applicable term. Most everyone I remember from STS 95 was, while usually a bit geeky (myself definitely included), at least functionally socially adept. Most quite so - well adjusted, smart, funny, wonderful individuals. However, it's downright distasteful that rather than discussing the effort that goes into something like this and the personalities behind it, the author focuses on whether these people fit the stereotypes of nerdiness. It seems as if he did his abject best to trivialize these students and their work.

As far as pure science vs. applied science... I was one of the finalists while it was still the old Westinghouse STS (1995, to be exact). That year, there was a great amount of theoretical or pure science, with very little engineering-type research projects. Pure science did quite well that year, as I recall.

Any other former STSers out there slacking on /. ?

Nathan D. Holmes, STS Finalist 1995

Patents Uber Alles

[daina]

Quite a few of them have patents pending for their work. Now that's starting kids off right!

Get an idea and keep it to yourself, so you can make a lot of money, kids. Then you can afford the house with six bathrooms and the fucking SUV. Then you can bring some more Haitians and Venezuelans into your fat, rich suburban American neighborhoods to mow your lawn and cook your food.

This is not science. This is a bloody obscenity.

Dumbstruck

[Sean Clifford]

The AC who posted about the Slate article being insulting was right on the money. Obviously, they sent the wrong reporter to cover this story. Someone with a science background would have been able to say something meaningful about the Science Talent Search. I got far more from the synopsis [sciserv.org] than the Slate article.

I have to say, the work these young students have done is nothing short of amazing. Herbert Hedberg's work on analyzing telomerase inhibitors resulted in a tool that can run the analysis in 10 minutes compared to the standard method which takes 2 days. Imagine the potential impact that can have on the treatment of cancer patients, like his grandmother.

Boris Alexeev's work may yield this guy a visit from the NSA. With minimization of deterministic finite automata you have - as the article points out - a tool to reduce the memory and processing requirements of certain kinds of operations such as speech and optical character recognition - however, the article failed to point out another obvious application - signal processing with tons of applications in video and audio surveillance/recognition.

Ryna Karnik's work applies directly to processor manufacturing - using a focused ion beam instead of photolithorgraphy to etch wafers. I read about a similar technique, but using electron beams in a sub-.03 micron process.

Anyway, I was dumbstruck that these teenagers have produced such groundbreaking, original research. With encouragement and a suitable academic environment, teens can blossom - not just the gifted ones - and do amazing work that belies the stereotyping surrounding their age.

As gifted teens, I remember how few adults took me and my friends seriously, much less listen to our ideas. As a society, American really needs to invest more money, time, and expertise in our educational system to ensure that more of our youth can have futures as bright as these student-researchers.

Re:Dumbstruck

[crushinghellhammer]

In my opinion, what is really sad is that the author of the Slate article is so concerned about the names and ethnicities of the people participating. If this was a mere statistical note, one can understand, but desperately trying to fit kids into stereotypes, going by their names, is pathetic.

Whether a participant's name is Gaurav or Gary it shouldn't make an iota of difference on how a science project, or the person, is judged. The only thing that matters in a competition of this nature is MERIT.

While the author and many of her ilk are likely to be worried about whether the kids are "weirdos", what they seem to fail to understand, or want to ignore, is the fact that these kids are very good at what've they attempted to do, and have made the effort.

It's sad that most of us Americans are so quick to attach labels such as "geek" and "nerd" to talented students.

In February, I coached a fifth grader to take a series of tests pitched at the eighth grade level. These were for a course at Stanford University. The first question my friends asked me when I told them about this bright young boy was "So, is he the kind of kind everybody hates talking to?". THE FIRST QUESTION that popped into their minds was that. And I know for a fact that they are not alone in being captive to those thought processes.

The reason that Asian kids do so well in our schools is that education is placed at a premium in their homes. People encourage them to perform better at school. While it is also not true that American parents do not value education, it is definitely a fact that most of them are less likely to apply the pressure in the name of "keeping kids stress-free".

Perhaps the reason it's so insulting...

[kevinatilusa]

...is who Slate chose as the author of the article. Looking at the "by the same author" at the end of the article, it seems like Slate decided to assign its 'Parenting' columnist instead of any sort of science writer. Is it surprising that she then decided to focus on the "nerdiness" and "looks like a jock" aspects rather than the projects themselves?

Re:Patents Uber Alles

[daina]

You are not even slightly correct.

I am not going to get into a pissing contest with you, but I have more advanced qualifications and degrees than most people. I have had a reasonably successful career in science, and it is a subject near and dear to my heart.

I will not sit quiet when I see the fundamental principles of science (openness of information, discovery for its own sake, intellectual curiosity) perverted by a rotten American corporation like Intel and foisted on unsuspecting children.

These kids are being taught (a) that science is no good without practical application and (b) that they have to protect their so-called "intellectual property" with patents.

Even if this represents reality in the "New American Century", isn't it a little early to be indoctrinating them into the rat-race?

And my post is not a troll. It is an opinion. A strong one, yes, but sometimes strong opinions are necessary to point out the serious problems with something that otherwise looks about as controversial as flag-waving and apple pie.

I've done a fair bit of moderating on Slashdot, and I think moderation is necessary in order to filter out the crap, but now I see that it is being used to limit freedom of speech when someone presents ideas with which you Yanks are uncomfortable. I'm not going to continue to moderate, because I believe that it is being abused. I had a sense that my post would be modded down, so I thought, "let's try it".

Finally: these are the children of the American Dream. It is a sick dream, and it needs to end. Teaching children to patent their scientific endeavours is an atrocity, and modding me down won't make it otherwise.

Re:hmmm.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

The only help I got from my parents was their encouragement because they sure as hell didn't understand the work I was doing

Ditto. That made me smile. I was in the honors group in STS40 (I think??? It was in 1983) and my mom didn't have a clue what I was doing, but I got lots of encouragement.

Re:hmmm.

[HeyLaughingBoy]

(not that I said parents and not parent)

Just couldn't let this one slide. I made it to the honors group in Westinghouse '83. Sure, I wasn't one of the final 40, but at least I made it to the previous level. I also was being raised by a single mother who didn't even have a high-school diploma, but understood that I needed education and pushed me when I needed it.

While I agree that all other things being equal, a child is better off with two loving parents than just one, your statement does a disservice to all the struggling, loving single parents out there.