
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, April 11, 1994                   TAG: 9404110055
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: WYTHEVILLE                                LENGTH: Medium

HIGH SCHOOLERS HONORED FOR PROWESS IN SCIENCE

More than 100 awards went to high school students at the third annual Blue Ridge Highlands Science Fair on Saturday.

The grand award winners were James Clark of Giles High School and Sarah Simpkins, representing Pulaski County High School and the Southwest Virginia Governor's School.

They will get an expense-paid trip to Birmingham, Ala., later this year to compete in the 49th International Science and Engineering Fair.

If one of them cannot go, alternate Setul Patel of Narrows High School would be the replacement.

Patel's project won first place in the senior engineering category. He also took the fair's Junior Engineering Technical Society Award, U.S. Department of Energy Award and Yale Science and Engineering Association Award.

Clark was first in the mathematics category and Simpkins in earth and space sciences. Each of them won a U.S. Department of the Navy Science Award.

More than 200 students from schools in Bland, Carroll, Floyd, Giles, Grayson, Smyth, Pulaski and Wythe counties and the city of Galax competed for 130 awards. The competition is co-sponsored by Wytheville Community College and New River Community College.

Clark, Simpkins, Patel and the other first-place winners are eligible to compete in the state science fair in Northern Virginia. The other first-place winners in the senior division were:

Lee Eure, Pulaski County High and Governor's School, behavioral and social science; Sarah Combs, Chilhowie High, biochemistry; Suzanne Kirby, Pulaski County High and Governor's School, botany; Katie Machi, George Wythe High and Governor's School, chemistry; Adam Phelps, Floyd County High and Governor's School, computer science; David Manley, Fort Chiswell High, environmental science; Julie Creger, Rural Retreat High, medicine and health; Bronwen Cox, Floyd County High and Governor's School, microbiology; Jeremy Sebens, Carroll County High, physics; and Sarah Williams, Pulaski County High, microbiology.

In the junior division, Sumeet Sarin from Blacksburg Middle School was first in biological sciences and Nathan Diller, Dayspring Christian Academy, physical science.

The two junior division winners also shared this year's Todd Cassell Memorial Award. Cassell, a student at Scott Memorial in Wytheville, won a first place in last year's junior division. He was killed last summer in a tractor accident.

by CNB