why do YOU think the top intel winners have been women the past few years?

[siserune]

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Okay, here’s a different twist on the ISEF fair. My child was one of the winners but his magnet program director insists that what he did for ISEF was a “personal” pursuit, and because he had to do a lot of it offsite, won’t count it for his research grade despite being a winner at this and other competitions. S pursued this project on his own, didn’t ask a mentor for a project, and really worked hard. He did a lot of work with statistics, etc. in class. But this administrator thinks anything offsite is not “real” research. It’s a long story, but at the end of the year (in two weeks) there’s a mandatory research symposium at school, and he’s not allowed to show anything he did for Intel because it was done primarily offsite, and is being asked to write a new paper, do a new board, etc. We told our son to just get it done, but he is really hurt. He’s graduating this year but this has put a huge damper on his excitement. Any thoughts?

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<p>Yes. First, congratulations on ISEF. Second, if there is no valedictorian status or merit scholarship GPA computation at stake, failing the research class will never make any difference in your son’s life, and he need not waste another second on any associated make-work.</p>

[QuantMech]

<p>@jeli25: If it were my son . . . since he did the work with statistics in class and since that apparently “counts,” I’d probably ask whether he could present just the statistical analysis of the data that he generated for the Intel project–as if he had done a statistical analysis of someone else’s data. But then, I’m basically an appeaser.</p>

<p>Nevertheless, it doesn’t escape me that your son’s situation is truly absurd! The absurdity of it, in itself, makes it pretty clear that the program director won’t be swayed by reason. So the real question is whether there is anyone higher up the administrative chain who will, or whether there is anyone higher up who would be swayed by the prospect of adverse publicity . . . and whether you and your son would have the stomach for that route.</p>

<p>This really shouldn’t happen. As a society, we lose enough promising young scientists–whom we really need–as it is, and no one should be setting up obstacles for them. That consideration still applies, even if this situation has no negative impact on your son’s scientific momentum.</p>