Epic STEM Fair -- Be a Judge!

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Help develop the next generation of STEM innovators! Jefferson County Public Library is recruiting judges to help with the Epic STEM Fair, the culmination of a two-month STEM exploration in partnership with Jefferson County Middle Schools, from October to December 2019. Here's who we're looking for and what you'd do:

• Judges should be professionals working in, or retired from, various STEM fields.
• Judges will help students build their self-confidence and practice executive functioning and presentation skills. They'll help students actually visualize themselves as scientists, technologists, engineers and mathematicians.
• The Epic STEM Fair will be held on Friday, December 13, at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. In the morning, judges will help students "present" their projects and findings, asking them relevant questions about their work and processes, and evaluating their efforts. Then in the afternoon (following a catered lunch), they will work in teams to rank the students’ projects for prizes.

STEM Fair project entries will be in the following 7 categories:

1. Better Bots! Design a machine or robot to solve a real-world problem.
2. Clean up your mess! Human impact on local ecosystems can be negative. Identify a local impact and offer a solution.
3. Selfie! Develop a self-contained ecosystem to provide food for a future colony on Mars and demonstrate photosynthesis in action.
4. Up a creek without a paddle. Design a method to efficiently move two pounds of weight across water within a structure no larger than 8" X 11".
5. Is it hot or is it just me? Design a system that either amplifies or decreases the greenhouse effect.
6. Citizen Science. Participate in a citizen science project creating a presentation based on your observations and findings.
7. Less is more. Reduce, reuse, recycle - find an innovative solution for waste.

Interested? Complete the Epic STEM Fair Volunteer Application at https://jeffcolibrary.org/volunteer/volunteer-application/. For more information, contact Debby Ridgell, Volunteer Program Coordinator, at debby.ridgell@jeffcolibrary.org, or 303-275-2212.