Judging Rubric
IMPORTANT: Whether you have extensive experience as a science fair judge, or you are a "rookie," please review the rubric below, which includes detailed information on the judging guidelines, criteria, and helpful tips for judging effectively in our "virtual" fair!
Judging Time Spent per Exhibit
Because this is a "virtual" fair, you do not have the benefit of interacting with the student(s) directly to ask questions and clarify your understanding of their exhibit.
Instead, you will be reviewing video presentations during that time from each of your selected exhibits. The videos can be accessed online from the links sent to you in your evaluation packet email. The videos may come in the form of a narrated PowerPoint or slide presentation and may include video of the presenters. Some exhibits, especially on the Elementary and Middle School levels, will feature more than one contributor per exhibit and possibly more than one video link. The total duration of all videos per exhibit from the Elementary, Middle, and High School exhibits should be no longer than 4, 6, and 10 minutes, respectively, regardless of the number of videos per exhibit. However, if there are three students in an Elementary School exhibit, each student can have 2 minutes individually if they can collaborate on a team video.
In addition, you will be asked to evaluate documentation from each of your selected exhibits. The documentation for each exhibit is provided in your evaluation packet email. The documentation will include a summary of the project and a set of responses to a standard questionnaire designed to address some of the Judging Criteria explained below.
Besides your evaluation packet email, both the video(s) and documentation for each exhibit that you evaluate will also be embedded within the Exhibit Evaluation Form. This will provide you the added opportunity to re-examine the content you were given at the same time you are rendering scores for each exhibit.
Therefore, you should allocate enough time to review the materials submitted to you from each of your selected exhibits. We recommend that you spend at least 15-20 minutes per exhibit. Your goal is to feel confident that you have evaluated each project adequately, objectively, and fairly.
Judging Guidelines
We recommend that you visit the Exhibit Evaluation Form before you start judging to print a blank form, which will list your specific exhibits and allow you to record your notes and interim scores during your evaluations. Please note that printing a blank ballot with the information from your assigned exhibits may result in upwards of 60 pages!
When you have completed your evaluations, you can return to the Exhibit Evaluation Form to transcribe your scores online from your written notes.
You also have the option to save your entries online along the way. You will receive a link by email to allow you to continue editing your entries after your first save. Please use this link to periodically revisit the form to make further changes or additions to your entries.
Because you will have only one opportunity to submit your scores in the online form, do NOT click on the "Submit" button unless you have completed your evaluations and are prepared to submit your final scores.
Judging Criteria
Each exhibit you judge will be based on five criteria: Creative Ability, Scientific Thought, Thoroughness, Skill, and Clarity
Creative Ability
Is this an original idea or an original approach to a new idea? Both are good.
Does the student show ingenuity in the materials, apparatus & techniques or was the exhibit from a purchased kit?
Does the student demonstrate the ability to improvise and adapt?
Is the project a collection, or is it a purposeful one?
Scientific Thought
Does the exhibit show: organized procedures, accurate measurements and/or observations, controlled experiments, cause & effect reasoning, theories, analysis, and synthesis?
Weight should be given to the likely amount of real study and effort represented in the exhibit. The project cannot be just a demonstration or an attractive display.
Thoroughness
How completely has the student explored or studied the problem? Was evidence gathered as data in notebooks, journals, or logbooks?
Are there bibliographies, charts, tables, and graphs?
Does the exhibit identify experimental organisms and/or apparatus?
Skill
Is the workmanship good?
Does the student show evidence of mastery of techniques?
Did the student construct his/her own apparatus?
Are the overall construction and “look” of the project neat, organized, easy to read, sturdy, and self-supporting?
Clarity
Are links to online video presentations and documentation working?
Are the sound and image on video presentations clear and easy-too-understand?
Does the display clearly explain what was done?
Does the exhibit provide a neatly written, well-organized backboard that is easy to follow?
Things that ensure clarity are: labels, guide marks, well-written descriptions, emphasis on important items, labeled graphs, labeled tables, legends underneath graphs and tables. Does the exhibit provide these?
Tips for Judging Effectively
Basis for Your Evaluation
Some exhibits, especially those at the Elementary and Middle School levels, may have more than one student contributing. Do not weigh exhibits with more contributors any more or less than those with fewer contributors.
At the same time, when evaluating an exhibit with multiple contributors, you must judge the overall exhibit as a whole. Each contributor should be participating equally, albeit using different skill sets and addressing different aspects of the project. Don't evaluate the exhibit solely based on the best or worst of the contributors in that exhibit.
Again, because you do not have the benefit of interacting directly with the student(s), you will need to base your evaluation on the quality and content of the submitted video(s) and documentation. Your judgment should focus on those aspects of their project that relate to the specific judging criteria of Creative Ability, Scientific Thought, Thoroughness, Skill, and Clarity. However, you may also want to consider how you might answer other general questions based on the information provided. Below are examples to help you getting started.
Personal Reflections from the Student(s)
Did the student(s) explain why they selected this project?
Did the student(s) describe the most interesting part of doing their project?
Did the student(s) reflect on one thing that was done in this project that made them proud?
Did the student(s) uncover anything surprising?
Did the student(s) reveal the most important thing learned from doing this project?
Creative Ability
How did the student(s) come up with the hypothesis for the project?
How did the student(s) decide on the approach used to test their hypothesis?
Did the student(s) describe any previous work or ideas that led them to think that this project would be useful and worth pursuing.
Did the student(s) discuss what sparked their interest in this general area? A teacher? A book? A TV show?
Do you have an understanding of why they chose this particular project?
Scientific Thought
Did the student(s) present an overview of what relationship they hoped to establish between variables?
Did the student(s) highlight a variable in the experiment and how they measured it? Did they indicate how their measurements were?
How did they decide which variables to control?
Did they indicate the biases or sources of errors in their measurements or procedures?
Did they present any lessons learned from their findings?
Thoroughness
Which sources were used to research the topic and experiment?
How did they decide how much data were needed to collect for this project?
Did the student(s) indicate the need to change direction mid-way through the project, and if so, why? Was the reason sound? How did they change procedures and methodology to cope?
Were their measurements sufficiently precise to persuade you to believe their results?
Did the project follow all appropriate and relevant safety and research protocols?
Skill & Effort
Did the student(s) indicate how long it took to complete this project?
Did they describe the most time-consuming task?
Based on the materials that you reviewed for the project, can you determine the skills that were used to complete this project?
Did the video and documentation showcase good communication skills relevant to the age of the student(s)?
Clarity & Understanding
Were the video and associated documentation clear and easy to understand?
Did you understand the purpose of their project?
Did you understand the key question or hypothesis addressed in this project?
Did the student(s) highlight the most important finding of their project?
Did the student(s) describe why their findings were important and how they apply to the real world?
Additional Line of Questions
Of course, don’t feel that it is necessary to stick with the above questions. Be creative!
Use your technical expertise and background to consider the use of Socratic questioning to extract information from the materials provided to you from the student(s).
Also consider whether the student followed standard protocols for their projects. Our HS exhibits follow proper protocol. They need to meet WESEF standards!
MOST IMPORTANT: all submitted projects that involve any living creature or human MUST be carried out under an IACUC or IRB protocol, respectively. This requirement is mandated by all peer-reviewed journals and all funding sources before a project is considered for publication or accepted for review. This requirement MUST be signed off by a teacher before the exhibit is allowed to participate in the fair.
If the project involves living creatures or humans, and it does not demonstrate or indicate compliance with this requirement of IACUC or IRB protocol, respectively, then as a judge, you should assign the lowest score (0) for Thoroughness to the exhibit; thereby, disqualifying it from any award consideration.
Scoring Scheme
Your Exhibit Evaluation Form will show the names of your selected exhibits. Below each name is an area for you to enter a score for each of the five criteria: Creative Ability, Scientific Thought, Thoroughness, Skill, and Clarity.
You should select the score for each criterion on the same integer grade scale of 0-10 using the Scoring Descriptors table below.
The Exhibit Evaluation Form will NOT allow you to submit your scores unless you have entered a score for each criterion of each of your selected exhibits.
After receiving your scores electronically, we use a separate spreadsheet to apply the following weights for each criterion based on level against your integer score:
The Overall Score from a judge is calculated on a scale of 0-100 using a weighted geometric mean of the scores given for each criterion.
The Final Rating of an exhibit, which determines its rank among other exhibits in its level and category, is based on a mean of all the Overall Scores for that exhibit, statistically adjusted for variation in scoring among all judges in the level to compensate for especially lenient or strict judges.
The Awards Ceremony will be streamed "live" on our Facebook page and YouTube Channel on Saturday, April 27. The results will also be posted on this website. We will also publicize the results through local media, notify award winners by email, and send awards out by mail.
Please direct any judging questions or comments regarding this rubric to the Judges' Committee at Judges@DiscoveryCtr.org or 845-621-1260 x-402.
Some Additional Resources from Other Sites
https://student.societyforscience.org/judging-criteria-intel-isef
https://science-fair.org/judges-3/category-judges/judging-criteria/
https://www.dummies.com/education/science/knowing-how-to-impress-the-science-fair-judges/
Please proceed to the next section to learn more about the Participating Schools & Conflict of Interest.