By Bob McDonnell

The Surveyor

Thompson School District held its eighth annual science fair Saturday, Jan. 11 at Thompson Valley High School in Loveland.

A total of 66 students presented their experiment results at the school. Each exhibit followed the format of an introduction, abstract, hypothesis, results and conclusion.

At the elementary school level, Berthoud was well-represented with Berthoud Elementary and Ivy Stockwell Elementary School’s participation. Overall, Berthoud students at the kindergarten through fifth grades received six awards.

Turner Middle School (TMS) dominated the secondary school competition with 16 students winning awards of the 19 total entries. In the chemistry division, TMS student Makenna Witting received an honorable mention. His classmate, Jack Houchin won a first-place ribbon.

TMS garnered two awards in the environmental/plant/earth/energy and transportation category, with Bryan Lawless winning second place and Grant Barkeen first place.

The middle school engineering saw the top three spots occupied by TMS students. Carson Bagley-third place, Ayden Wolf-second place and Rhee McDermid—first place.

The trend continued with the physics category. Ian Curry got second place and Daniel Mahoney first place.

In addition to the competition, students attending watched an entertaining and educational science show put on by TMS teacher, Kevin Gonzales and Alex Knueven. Gonzales coordinated the science fair for TMS in past years. He’s now doing engineering and design at TMS. Knueven is the new eighth grade TMS science teacher. He was a student teacher last year for Gonzales.

Students that won at this competition are not done. They are now eligible to compete at the Longs Peak Regional Science Fair at the University of Northern Colorado in February.