The Canada-Wide Science Fair is on this week at the University of Regina

By Dale Johnson Posted: May 16, 2017 6:00 a.m.

Nora Boone from St. John’s, Newfoundland, (left) and Bilun Sun from Montreal are just two of the hundreds of students visiting the University of Regina and taking part in the Canada-Wide Science Fair.
Nora Boone from St. John’s, Newfoundland, (left) and Bilun Sun from Montreal are just two of the hundreds of students visiting the University of Regina and taking part in the Canada-Wide Science Fair. Photo: External Relations

Some of Canada’s brightest young scientists are in Regina to showcase solutions to global issues.

In all, there are 460 students from grades 7 to 12 at the U of R this week. They were winners at over 100 regional science fairs. They have a chance to share awards, prizes and scholarships totalling $1.2 million. The Canada-Wide Science Fair is also a chance for these students to meet others from across Canada.

“This is like the science Olympics for kids in Canada. These are the best and brightest from across Canada,” explains Dr. Mark Brigham, professor in the Department of Biology and an associate chief judge.

There are also 150 delegates – adults from each region of the country who come to keep an eye on the students.

The events are open to the public on May 18 and 19 – and school students from across southern Saskatchewan will come to the U of R to see the projects, and interact with the students visiting here from across Canada. There will be about 3,000 school students at the U of R on those two days as part of a program called STEAM, short for Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics.  

The public is also invited to come to the U of R May 18 to May 20 to see the projects. “That creates quite a buzz for the University,” says Brigham.

There will be a tour day on May 17, with field trips offered to places as far as Yorkton, Saskatoon and the Big Muddy Valley.

On Thursday afternoon the visiting students will also visit various labs and displays at the U of R in areas of special interest to them.

Brigham also says for the first time, all of the students will take part in an experiment, thanks to a PhD student in biology, Heather Haig.

“She has asked every student coming to the Canada-Wide Science Fair to bring a few millilitres of water from their taps at home. She is going to analyze all these water samples and produce a map of Canada about the type of water coming out of the taps across the country. This will end up as a scientific publication. She is going to do it on line, so all these students can see how to write a scientific paper,” he says.

This national event will also help to make high school science students from across Canada more aware of the U of R.

“It’s a great recruitment tool. We are going to show off science, our campus and our city. We want to show them a good time, and also show them that there’s cool science going on here,” Brigham says.