Past projects 8
Making Reactions Real!
Funded Nov 12, 2024Thank you so much!
Seniors at our school have been hard at work on their internal assessments, individual capstone projects required for their International Baccalaureate diplomas and certificates. Each student must design and conduct their own experiment, and several have chosen to investigate cell respiration in yeast or decomposition of hydrogen peroxide by catalase. The supplies from this project allowed them to explore these topics!
Juniors at our school just finished a full cycle of designing an experiment, collecting data, presenting their data in graphs, and explaining their findings. Their investigation of the effect of substrate concentration on enzyme activity was made possible by your donations. Thank you again!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
This classroom project was brought to life by Con Edison and 2 other donors.Lab Equipment for Young Scientists
Funded Nov 8, 2023Thank you for your generosity! My students were able to do three brand-new labs this year thanks to the new materials.
In the lab using the digital microscopes, students swabbed and dyed their own cheek cells, and made stomatal casts of the leaves of a spider plant. One great advantage of digital microscopes is that they can all see the same screen and point things out to each other instead of taking turns looking into a small eyepiece.
Students had two lab experiences with the spectrophotometer. In the first, they practiced serial dilutions and measured the absorbance of various solutions of food dye. Next, they directly measured the rate of photosynthesis using DPIP, a deep blue chemical that turns colorless during the chemical reduction reactions. The lighter the color, the greater the rate of photosynthesis and our students were able to observe this with their eyes and quantify it with the spectrophotometer.
I did not have access to this level of lab equipment until college, and I'm so grateful my students get to experience it now. Next year, when they are designing their own independent lab investigations, they will be able to get much richer data! Thank you again!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
This classroom project was brought to life by General Motors & Young Sheldon on CBS and 8 other donors.A-Massing Supplies for Student Scientists!
Funded Dec 15, 2017Thank you so much for your generosity! The high-precision scales are essential for so much of the lab work that my students do.
All our juniors and seniors are enrolled in International Baccalaureate courses. One of the lab practicals required by IB asks students to calculate the osmolarity of vegetable tissue. To do that, they need to create solutions of different molarities and then soak cubed potatoes in the different solutions. They calculate the change in the mass of the potato tissue by weighing the potatoes before and after soaking. The solution in which the potatoes do not change mass is isotonic to the potato tissue.
That experiment is just one example of the work made possible by the gift of these new scales. We appreciate it!
Thank you!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
This classroom project was brought to life by Con Edison and 4 other donors.Searching for Balance(s)
Funded Nov 4, 2017Thank you so much for your generosity! The scales have made a big difference in the kind of labs our students can do.
Our seniors are responsible for designing and carrying out their own original research project. Several of those projects required precise measurements. I'll describe one example.
One student was interested in modeling how the change in concentration of a solution affects cells soaking in the solution. She decided to use gummy bears to model this process. She soaked the gummy bears in solutions of varying concentrations and measured the percent change in mass of the bears. She used the new scales to measure out her salt for each solution, and to measure the masses of the gummy bears before and after soaking. She was only able to do this project because of this donation of high-precision scales!
Thank you!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
In Tare-ible Need
Funded Oct 25, 2017Thank you so much for your generosity! The scales have made a big difference in the kind of projects our students can do.
Our seniors are responsible for designing and carrying out their own original research project. Several of those projects required precise measurements. I'll describe one example.
One student is investigating the effect of substrate concentration on the rate of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction. She decided to measure cellular respiration in yeast. She mixed yeast with different concentrations of sugar within a flask and stretched a balloon over the mouth of the vessel. As the yeast metabolized the sugar, it produced carbon dioxide, which inflated the balloon. She used the donated scales to precisely measure the mass of yeast in order to keep it constant. She also used a scale to precisely measure different masses of sugar, in order to create her independent variable conditions. She ended up with beautiful data demonstrating an increase in enzyme activity up to a plateau. It was an amazing opportunity for her to actually experience and observe an essential principle of biology.
Thank you!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
Pride Buttons for the Queer-Straight Alliance
Funded Jun 6, 2017Thank you so much for the button maker!
The Queer-Straight Alliance celebrated National Coming Out Day with a special button-making event. Students made buttons to express their own identities, to show support for the LGBTQ community, and just for fun! We had a good turnout with lots of laughter and community building. I feel very optimistic about QSA this year, based on our positive kick-off.
Our next step will be using the button maker to make buttons to sell as a fundraiser for our club. I'm looking forward to it!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
Safety Supplies for Student Scientists
Funded Sep 10, 2017Thank you for the generous donation of lab safety supplies!
The glassware disposal box is safer for my students and for our custodians. The one-way flap makes it so no one can reach into the box. When the box is full, you seal it and throw it away. No one is exposed to the dangerous broken glass.
The gloves will be especially important as the seniors begin their IB internal assessments, independent, long-term investigations of their own design. Because many students use acid or other dangerous chemicals, they need gloves to stay safe.
Thank you on behalf of our whole school community!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
Glasswhere? Student Scientists Need Beakers!
Funded Oct 31, 2016Thank you again from the bottom of my heart. It's really inspiring to see so many people care about quality science education in public schools. You can see how excited my students are in the unboxing photos! If you requested thank-you notes, they are written and will be mailed soon.
It's hard to describe how my students have used their new glass beakers, because we use them almost every day, in so many ways!
I will describe a few projects that some of our seniors are working on this year. As part of the International Baccalaureate program, students' capstone science experience is to independently design, carry out, and analyze their own research projects related to a topic of personal interest.
Andy is investigating ocean acidification, by soaking seashells in different molarities of hydrochloric acid. Ivan is investigating factors that affect enzyme-catalyzed reactions, by changing the concentration of starch and measuring its effect on amylase activity. Tirtho is also investigating enzyme activity, by changing the temperature at which rennin acts on proteins in milk. Briana is using agar plates to measure the effect of cinnamon essential oil on E. coli colonies. Jing Ting is using de-shelled eggs to investigate the effect of temperature on osmosis.
All of the investigations described above required students to use beakers in some way-- to measure, mix, pour, heat, etc! Thank you again for ensuring that our student scientists have access to important laboratory glassware. They (and I) so appreciate it!”
With gratitude,
Mx. Martin
This classroom project was brought to life by Con Edison and 7 other donors.