Magnet News: Winter 2016

Teacher of the Year: Mr. Samir Paul has been selected as the MCPS Marian Greenblatt Education Fund Rising-Star Teacher of the Year!

Many students have won major awards in math, science, and computer science in recent months:

• • Seniors Arnold Mong and Josephine Yu were named Finalists in the Intel Science Talent Search! Eric Chen, Noah Fang, Yaelle Goldschlag, Amy Li, Raymond Lin, Brian Morris, and Rona Yu were also named Semifinalists. Only one other school had multiple finalists, and Blair's nine semifinalists is more than any other school in the nation! (pdf)

  • Seniors Eric Lu and Arnold Mong, Juniors Alex Miao and Jamie Vinson, and Sophomore Elliot Kienzle won the Maryland Science Bowl! They will represent Maryland at the National Science Bowl in April! (pdf)

  • Senior Arnold Mong, and Juniors Emma Jin, Alex Miao, Lara Shonkwiler, and Jamie Vinson won the 2016 Chesapeake Bay Bowl! They will represent the Chesapeake Bay region at the National Ocean Science Bowl in April!

  • Freshman Daniel Zhu won first place in the University of Maryland High School Mathematics Competition! Sophomore Guangqi Shi and Senior Eric Lu tied for second place. (photo on Twitter)

  • Juniors Sambuddha Chattopadhay and Abigail Wilson were 2 of the only 67 students in the world who earned perfect scores on the 2015 AP Computer Science exam! (Twitter)

  • Senior Cynthia Liu won a bronze medal in the 2015 Math Prize for Girls Olympiad.

Several students are publishing and publicizing their research:

• Senior Haena Lee's research paper, Using Standardized Uptake Value Ratios to Reduce Positron Emission Tomography Scanning Time for Athletes with Repetitive Mild Traumatic Brain Injuries (pdf), has been selected for publication in the 2016 Columbia Research Scholars Journal.

  • Junior Ali Anwar is a named co-author on a paper published in IEEE Security & Privacy, based on work he conducted at the University of Maryland: Colluding Apps: Tomorrow's Mobile Malware Threat

  • Sophomore Katherine Wu presented her invention, the Driver's Companion, to America's Greatest Makers.

  • Freshman Daniel Schaffer is a named co-author on a paper published in Nucleic Acids Research, based on work he conducted with mentors at NIH: Comparative genomic analyses reveal a vast, novel network of nucleotide-centric systems in biological conflicts, immunity and signaling

Some students have also won honors outside of their schoolwork:

• • Junior Rourke Smith was awarded a Boy Scout Honor Medal, the second highest honor a scout can receive, for saving his friend's life when they were caught in a rip tide at Rehoboth Beach.

  • Senior Amy Li won a silver medal and two bronze medals at the 2015 World Wushu Championships in Jakarta, Indonesia.