Engaging with science at the U of M

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This article was published 17/03/2015 (4095 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Over 400 students gathered at the Max Bell Centre last week for the Manitoba First Nations Science Fair.

The three-day event was an opportunity for students from as far as Nelson House to become engaged in science.

“The Manitoba First Nations Science Fair promotes science education and achievement in First Nations schools,” Lorne Keeper, executive director of Manitoba First Nations Education Resource Centre Inc., said in a statement. “With over 400 student participants each year, it’s one of the fastest-growing regional science fairs in Canada. We partner with the University of Manitoba to offer a science fair that often influences students to attend university.”

Brendan Linklater, 12, and Joseph Berard, 11, from Otetiskiwin Kiskinwamahtowekamik School in Nelson House participated in the science fair with a display on comets.

The display featured a comet made from Styrofoam with a small hole that when filled with baking soda, vinegar, and cat litter, simulated a melting comet.

“You know sometimes, when comets are in space, they can melt and blow up – they call them dusty snowballs so that’s why I put the cat litter, to make it look dirty,” Linklater explained.

Berard said the most interesting part of the project was learning about the gases that surround the comet and the melting process, called sublimation, as the comet passes through gas clouds in space.