COURTESY OF UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII SCHOOL OF OCEAN & EARTH SCIENCES
Members of the Maui High School Ocean Science Bowl Team are Jonathan Nguyen, left, Justin Recamara, Caine Jette, coach Ed Ginoza, Rebecca Wunder and Christian Ling.
Maui High wins
state science contest
Maui High School for the second year has won the Hawaii Ocean Science Bowl, and the five-member team will go to South Carolina next month for the national competition.
Team members are:
>> Becky Wunder, a junior enrolled in advanced placement chemistry, was a member of last year's team and is co-captain of this year's team.Eight teams participated in the recent regional competition from Maui, Oahu and Guam.
>> Caine Jette, a sophomore enrolled in advanced placement chemistry, is team co-captain.
>> Jonathan Nguyen, a junior enrolled in advanced placement physics, is participating for the first time in the Ocean Science Bowl but has been on the school's Science Bowl Team for three years and was team captain this year.
>> Christian Ling, a junior enrolled in advanced placement physics, also is participating in his first Ocean Science Bowl but has been on the Science Bowl team for three years.
>> Justin Recamara, a sophomore enrolled in honors chemistry, is also on the Ocean Science Bowl team for the first time.Ed Ginoza, retired chemistry and physics teacher and volunteer coach of the Maui High School team, said preparation was the hardest part.
The students had a strong science background, but none had been in a marine science or oceanography class and they "had to read on their own," he said. They met twice a week to discuss potential questions and concepts.
"The competition is always tough as we never know who's out there," he said. "It could be a school with a good program, but it could just be individuals and teams who are willing to work on their own."
He said the Maui High School team was lucky because the members, "as young as they are, are seasoned veterans with two National Science Bowl attendance and two students with one National Science Bowl competition."
In the Ocean Bowl competition, the students were asked three types of questions: toss-up, bonus and team-challenge. Toss-up questions have to be answered within five seconds; bonus questions have to be solved within 20 seconds.
The students felt the most difficult part of the state competition was the team challenge question, Ginoza said.
It was written out and handed to the teams at the half-time of each round. Students had from three to five minutes to work together and apply their knowledge to solve the question.
The students are already hard at work reading and studying to compete with 23 other teams in the National Ocean Science Bowl April 23-26 in Charleston, Ginoza said.
He's trying to get additional material from the University of Hawaii to help them and they meet an average of twice a week. "The kids have to do a lot of work on their own but they understand that."
The Ocean Science Bowl was developed to encourage interest in ocean sciences among high school students and make the public more aware of the importance of the oceans in daily lives. A long-term goal is to develop the next generation of marine scientists, educators and policy-makers for ocean sciences.
Ginoza believes most of the Maui Ocean Science Bowl students will end up in some sciences. Juniors Jonathan Nguyen and Christian Ling are already talking about the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he said.
