LAMORINDA WEEKLY | Top honors awarded to Lamorinda teens at Contra Costa Science Fair


Contra Costa Science Fair winners Photo provided

At the Contra Costa Science Fair this spring the Jaguars of Joaquin Moraga Intermediate School were well represented with winners in the physical sciences and engineering categories. Seventh-grader Henry Johnson won second place for his project: "Particle Accelerator Power" in the seventh-grade engineering category and Daniel Berkes won third place in physical sciences eighth-grade for his project investigating the "Presence of Dangerous Herbicides Atrazine and Simazine in Popular Tea Brands." Isabelle Katz, a JM eighth-grader, won first place in physical science (eighth-grade) for her project "Characterizing Musical Instruments using Signal Analysis," and she also won the middle school Junior Sweepstakes, which is awarded to the top three middle school projects at the fair. Isabelle was chosen to represent Contra Costa County at the California State Science Fair at the end of April along with Campolindo High School Freshman, Cathy Kenderski, who won first place at the county science fair in physical science (ninth-grade) for her work on "Fantastic Plastic: Using Hydrolysis to Facilitate the Degradation of Polymers in Plastic." Good luck to Isabelle and Cathy at the State Science Fair, which is being held April 29-30 in Los Angeles at the California Science Center.