National contest is battled with brains

tool name

tool name

Students headed for science contest

Six Triangle students will compete Friday for a chance to win the country's most prestigious science prize for teens.

The students will join 10 of their peers in Atlanta as regional finalists for the 2009 Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology. Regional winners can win up to $3,000 and a chance to compete for the $100,000 national grand prize.

Five of North Carolina's seven finalists come from the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics in Durham. They are: Tian-Yi Jiang, Lanair Lett, Jinge Su, Di Deng and Patrick Yang. Yekaterina Shpanskaya, a home-schooled student in Raleigh, also qualified with her partner, Neil Shah of Greensboro.

N.C. teens finish second in science contest

Two North Carolina teenagers captured second place today in the prestigious Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology.

Judges at the national finals in New York City announced that Yekaterina "Katie" Shpanskaya, 15, a Raleigh home-schooled sophomore, and Neil Shah, 17, a senior at Northwest Guilford High School in Greensboro, were the first runner-up in the team category. They'll share a $50,000 scholarship.

It was also announced that Lanair Lett, 18, a senior from Henderson who attends the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics in Durham, finished in fourth place in the individual category. He'll receive a $30,000 scholarship.

3 in N.C. win Siemens prizes

Three North Carolina teenagers won big scholarships Monday at the national finals of the prestigious Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology.

Yekaterina "Katie" Shpanskaya, 15, a Raleigh home-schooler, and Neil Shah, 17, a senior at Northwest Guilford High School in Greensboro, will share a $50,000 second-place scholarship for their team research project. Lanair Lett, 18, a senior from Henderson who attends the N.C. School ofScience and Mathematics in Durham, won a $30,000 fourth-place prize for his individual project.

Six teams and six individuals vied for two $100,000 grand prizes in one of the top academic competitions in the nation. The finalists made it through a nationwide pool of 1,348 projects that was whittled down to 96regional finalists and then 12 national finalists.

Aiming for a prize

Regarding the Dec. 8 article "3 in N.C. win Siemens prizes," it's fantastic to know that students from North Carolina won such a prize!

As an 11-year-old in sixth grade at Culbreth Middle School, I think it'd be really cool to create a project for the Siemens Competition in Math, Science & Technology, trying to get to nationals to earn scholarship money! It's also nice to see that North Carolina's schools are good enough to get people that academically ready for a competition for a college scholarship.

It's a great thing to look forward to. These students give me something to aim for, and make me a proud citizen of North Carolina.

Summer toil wins science prize

While many teenagers slept in, played all day with their Facebook profiles or headed to the beach, Sajith Wickramasekara and Andrew Guo spent the summer dutifully reporting to a Duke University research lab, working hour after hour to make tumors more sensitive to cancer drugs.

The payoff came Monday when the 17-year-old seniors at the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics took a grand prize in the prestigious national Siemens Competition in Math, Science and Technology.

"There is no doubt that these scholars will change the world, starting right now, with their passion for science and math," Thomas McCausland, chairman of the Siemens Foundation, said after Monday's awards announcement.