The BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition is an amazing experience for not only students but teachers and the general public. The students from Comeragh College Science club were given the opportunity to enter this wonderful competition; luckily two groups,

Group 1 – Tadhg Sheehan, Aidan McGrath, Jennifer Long (3^rd year)

Group 2 –Lughaidh McLoughlin, Shannon Blackmore (3^rd year) and Timothy Innocent (2^nd Year) were successful in their submission to display their projects at the RDS in January.

The first teams Project entitled: To Investigate the Reading Habits of the New Generation. These students had decided on this project as one of the members of the group reads a vast number of books for both interest and pleasure and prefers reading to scrolling through online. He felt that when he reads, he enjoys a multitude of genres but mainly fantasy. This got him wondering was there a difference in the genre preference nowadays compared to that of the previous generation. The students also felt that social media had impacted their lives and the way they think, so they were interested to see did it affect the books and genres they choose to read compared to previous generations. The students investigated this through a series of interviews and questionnaires. The students found a few surprising results along with differences seen between the past and new generations in respect to book genre choice it was seen through the quantitative data that a staggering 42.9% of students that answered the survey said that they did not read any books.

The second groups project entitled: The Theorem of Polynomials. Where the students had worked on developing a faster and more efficient way of calculating polynomial expressions. These students did a series of calculations in order to make their formula work.

This exhibition allows students to grow and develop a real passion for science and the ability for them to think for themselves along with developing a curiosity about the world around them. It also builds their confidence in presenting as they learn how to articulate their ideas as they need to explain their project to judges. This hands on approach to science can benefit students and help them in all areas of their learning and life.

This experience was available to our students thanks to our sponsors from Quality Recycling, Derry . Without their help this would not have been possible.