This past Sunday, a group of SLA Students departed to represent Philadelphia and Bucks Counties at the annual PJAS State Competition. There, the students presented their Science Fair Projects to a panel of judges at the Pennsylvania State University. Sophomores DeSean McLoud and Jalisa Smith were honored with Third Awards. Ellen To and Owen Grzywinski's presentations earned the two sophomores Second Awards.

SLA Junior Manna-Symone Middlebrooks returned to her second PJAS State Fair to present a project on a Local Pollutant's Effect on Dissolved-Oxygen Producing Algae. This earned her both a First Award and a $2000/semester Scholarship to the Pennsylvania State University!

Finally, Senior Jeff Kessler earned a total of five awards at this year's competition! Jeff's study of the ElectroMagnetic Fields Emitted by Cell Phones not only earned him a First Award, but he achieved a perfect score of 5.0 (an additional distinction earned by less than 2% of all participants)! At the Special Award Ceremony, Jeff was also recognized for three years of participation at both the Regional and State levels, and won one of five Oerlein Awards for Outstanding Senior High School Science Student.

In total, SLA took home 10 State-Level awards and over $16,150 in monetary prizes! Congrats to all SLA PJAS State Participants!