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SCPS Awards for Academic Excellence


For nearly 60 years, the Los Angeles County Science Fair has showcased thousands of outstanding student scientific studies.  In addition to helping to sponsor the Fair, SCPS has presented its "Awards for Academic Excellence" since 2005.  At the Science Fair, SCPS Awards are given for several paleontology related projects each year to students in both the Junior (grades 6-8) and Senior (grades 9-12) Divisions.

In April 2009, recipients of the SCPS Awards for Academic Excellence were:
  • In the Junior Division, Shanaya Seddighi and Gwen Hunter of St. Martin of Tours School, shared the first place award for their project "Habitat Selection of Brine Shrimp".
  • In the Junior Division, Avi Vogel, an eighth grader at Kadima-heschel West Middle School.  received second prize for "Determining What Types of Rock Put Out More Heat by Boiling Them".
  • In the Senior Division, for the second consecutive year, Bonnie Lei, a sophomore at Walnut High School in Walnut Valley, received the first place award. This year, her project was "Cryptic Species and Synonyms:  A Reclassification of the Tropical Spurilla Genus". 
  • In the Senior Division, Emily Carrera of Convent Secondary School received second prize for "Planting Vitamins:  The Environmental Effects on Plant Nutrition". 

In April 2008, recipients of the SCPS Awards for Academic Excellence were:
  • In the Junior Division, Elizabeth Brajevich, an eighth grader from Miraleste Intermediate School in Palos Verdes.  Elizabeth received the first place award for her project "Acting Fishy:  The Comparison of Growth Between Frogs and Trout".
  • In the Junior Division, Joshua Navaratte, an eighth grader at Hollenbeck Middle School, Los Angeles.  Joshua received second prize for "Are Snail and Nautilus Shells Following the Same Pattern: Logarithm or Phi?"
  • In the Senior Division, Bonnie Lei, a freshman at Walnut High School in Walnut Valley.  Bonnie received the first place award for her project "To Speciate or Not to Speciate:  Population Structure of Haminoea vesicula". 
  • In the Senior Division, Kathryn Fukomoto, a senior at Palos Verdes High School.  Kathryn received second prize for "Classroom Radon Potential for School Sites on the Miocene Monterey Formation".
We look forward to recognizing superior student efforts like these in the years ahead, and to encouraging interest in, and expansion of, the field of paleontology.