<p>Guys I was at a local science fair held three weeks ago, and I have coem to doubt the stupidity of the judges, honestly I think they chose stupid projects with no worth at all. Furthermore I was EXTREMELY skeptical of one of the judges as he asked who I knew to get some reports, and I said my father worked at the lab and through him I had only aksed to get the director's permission then the reports. Now most of the time I will always give up victory with no holding back, but I think if you saw some of these projects you will truly be amazed. I was in the medicine and healthcare cateogory and the kid next to me won, it was "the effects of alcohol compared to kava on heartrate," and then another kid who I had known from middle school was telling me "his project was BS and he made things up" only he won to go to ISEF too! His project was horrible....... the effects of cramming, and he only studied a small group, 27 people.
Now my topic was practical, saved millions of used, and had a good future (relating to taking out a mainstream medical test for a newly developed and more accurate one). I thought I woudl DEFINATELY win, as a PhD, and three med school students all at different levels and different places told me how practical and needed this project was, and in fact some PhD had won first place for something similar at a major conference. The only project which could go up against mine was another kid I knew, he developed using spectroscopy a laser which points at the eye (thermal) and measures your glucose level, especially if you're diabetic. He had the coding down for the machine and the blue prints, he just didn't have the machien as he needed funding. Now if you compare my project and my main competitors (who also walked out with no prize whatsoever) I think we had ISEF projects compared to the chosen who will not win ANYTHING, GUARENTEED. Furthermore I think two of the judges had a bias against many muslims during the qualifications, one was a hasedic jew, and another a hindu man; the hindu man would always be very quiet and questioning when he came to all Muslims kids, but when Indians were there he would mouth off and laugh ALL the time, and I was not the only one to observe this. The Hasedic Jew asked me very unrelated questions and seemed as if he wanted to disqualify me and other Muslims. Many people were upset with the results and looked at them as if they were extremly stupid this year. I don't know what to do man, I guess I should call them, but will it be too late?</p>
<p>WOW....? where do you live zetsui. I can tell you right now that the Greater San Diego Science and Engineering Fair is nothing like that. People that win sweepstakes and who go to ISEF have very good projects. This is probably because San Diego is a bioengineering (arguably the hottest field out there right now) city, thus, many students have internships at these labs and come out with great projects. The county judge IMHO are not as knowledgable as you said, and I found myself a couple of years ago making up stuff yet still winning second prize. It's when you get to State and ISEF level do you feel the wrath of questions that judges ask you. For the discrimination issue, I don't think I have ever seen this, however I am Asian, so I can't speak personally because a lot of the judges maybe (20 percent) happen to be Asian also.</p>
<p>I still don't understand how they judge regional science fair projects. What do they look for in a project?</p>
<p>Jersey City, NJ I think I will call them tommorow</p>
<p>Are the judges at ISEF better than the judges at regional fairs? I live in Phoenix, AZ, and there was a thing in the paper about how the guy in charge of finding judges is like really desparate right now and my dad who works at Intel and my mentor at the Univ. and some other professors I know get soliciting emails all the time to be judges. It seems like they are taking anyone they can get...</p>
<p>
and say what? they have a crappy judge and you should've won? idk...</p>