At this year’s inaugural Google Global Science Fair, the three teenage winners turned in remarkable projects that grappled with real-world problems: carcinogens in food, increasing indoor air quality to help people with asthma, and fighting chemotherapy resistance in ovarian cancer patients. According to the Google blog, the judges were impressed by:
their intellectual curiosity, their tenaciousness and their ambition to use science to find solutions to big problems. They examined complex problems and found both simple solutions that can be implemented by the general public—like changing your cooking habits or removing toxins from your home—as well as more complex solutions that can be addressed in labs by doctors and researchers. …
The projects are the important thing here. But I can’t help feeling a little sisterly glee at the fact that the winners were all girls. Lauren Hodge won the 13-14 age, Naomi Shah the 15-16 age group, and Shree Bose the 17-18 category. They earned their sweet Lego trophies with their thoughtful approach to science, but their gender is getting them more attention today. Someday, perhaps three girls rocking a science fair won’t be news, but for now, it is.
