Bioathlon winners A.D. Johnson of Bessemer, MI

Dollar Bay H.S. team, 2nd Place winners

Lake Linden -Hubbell High School team members, 3rd Place winners

Slide Show 2006

News:

A.D. Johnson High School, Bessemer, MI
Takes First Place in Michigan Tech 2006 Bio-Athlon

The seventeenth annual Department of Biological Sciences Bio-Athlon for high school biology students was held on Wednesday, May 3, at Michigan Technological University. Simultaneously, a workshop was held for the accompanying biology teachers. The Bio-Athlon serves as a means to stimulate interest and problem-solving in biology among our area youth. Teams from 18 Upper Peninsula Michigan high schools participated.

The team winning FIRST PLACE was A.D. Johnson H.S. Bessemer, Mi.

Coach: David Rowe

The team winning SECOND PLACE was Dollar Bay -Tamarack City.

Coach: Sara Moilanen

The team winning THIRD PLACE was Lake Linden-Hubbell.

Coach: Nadine Plante

Each team was composed of four students who have not had formal class work in biology beyond the traditional sophomore high school general biology course. Teams had one hour for each of four problems:

1) Dissection Problem designed by Ronald Gratz, Ph.D.

2) Botany Quizbowl problem. Designed by Beth Scafone, M.S.

3) Field Identification Problem designed by John Hribljan, B.S. and Christa M. Luokkala.

4) Clinical Laboratory Science designed by Karyn Fay, M.S., MT (ASCP) SH, and Alice Soldan, M.S. MT (ASCP), CLS (NCA).

Dr. John Adler, Chair, Biological Sciences, and Dr. Maximilian Seel, Dean, College of Science and Arts, presented the awards. Each student participating in the competition received a Certificate of Appreciation and a Bio-Athlon T-shirt. Plaques were awarded to the first-, second- and third-place teams. In addition, each member of the first-place team will receive a $200 U.S. Savings Bond, each member of the second-place team will receive a $100 U.S. Savings Bond, and each member of the third-place team will receive a $50 U.S. Savings Bond.

Teacher activities included: a workshop on invasive species led by Stacy Cotey, M.S., Director of Outreach and Development for the School of Forest Resources & Environmental Science and a 2-hour excursion aboard MTU's Research Vessel Agassiz led by Captain Stephen Roblee, M.S., Joan Chadde, M.S., Education Program Coordinator for the Western UP Center for Science, Mathematics and Environmental Education, and Cory McDonald, Ph.D. candidate, Dept. of Civil & Environmental Engineering. The Agassiz excursion included sampling sediments and plankton in Portage Lake, as well as, an overview of nautical navigation.

Student Bio-Athlon activities and teachers’ workshops were organized by Jeff Lewin, M.S. and John Adler, Ph.D., Department Chair; Department of Biological Sciences. Funding was provided by MTU Admissions, the Department of Biological Sciences, the Michigan Tech Fund, and MTU Alumni Mark Cowan, M.D., Robert DellAngelo, M.D., Olive Kimball, D.Ed, Ph.D.

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