Wow. The last week. It has only been a month of waiting for me but for those of you in the finals competition I cannot even imagine the anticipation! It has been a long road for you, some of you submitting your papers in the first day we opened it up. Some of you are on your way, others will be making their way here next week. Some of you are coming from here on Long Island, others from the other side of the globe, but they are all amazing journeys of experimentation and innovation. I cannot wait to see these final projects in person and hear you speak of them in your own words.

For the final, I am happy to announce that unless something gets in the way, we are planning on live streaming part of the finals event on the CSTL facebook page! The stream will begin around 1:30pm EST (13:30 for some of you) and end around 4:30pm EST (16:30). So tell your friends and family to watch and find out all the exciting projects that have made it to our finals competition this year.

That is all I have for now, safe travels to those traveling, I will see you soon!

First off, I would like to follow up with Frank’s introduction by letting you all know my name is Kevin Sanders and I am your new Administrator! This week has been a whirlwind of fresh information and excited learning as I plunge head first into this new role and adventure for myself. I have been amazed at every turn at the response this competition receives and the vast range on ingenious submissions that have been sent in. There is still so much to be done before the Finalists competition on July 12th, but I am beyond excited to undertake this journey with you all, and am exceptionally excited to meet those of you attending our event at Stony Brook University next month. Everyone has been so helpful in helping me settle in and I am sure the event will be just as amazing as we are all expecting. 

Well, that is all for now, time to get back to work! But do not worry, you will be hearing from me again soon!

Kevin

So as you know, I, Frank DiGiovanni am leaving Clean Tech for a new adventure…No I’m not telling you where I’m going but the Competition is now in good hands, those of Kevin Sanders. I’ve been working with him to catch him up on all things Clean Tech!

Kevin has a background in Environmental Geoscience from University of Buffalo (western New York) and has worked with invasive species management and environmental education. I mean, talk about a total science person well suited to take over for Clean Tech! (I can tell he’s stoked to meet all of you at the Final too!)

He starts June 4th but not to worry, he’ll hit the ground running for the Final and I know he’ll be great.

 

Sadly, this is my last day, the 18th and I want you all to know it’s been a labor of love for all things STEM. The ideas that the students come up with continue to amaze me and give me hope for the future. Whether your team made the Final or not, let nothing stand in your way of advancing your idea; yours could be the next idea that does real good in the world, the one that Solves Climate Change.

Best of luck to you all,

-Frank DiGiovanni

It was not easy to whittle down the incredible semi-finalist teams to the top 10! It might not be easy to believe but the top 10 teams were separated by a total of 2.5 points! 2.5 POINTS!!  All of the Finalists have been invited. But I speak to you unselected semi-finalists, try to not be dejected. (Which I know is easy for me to say but not always easy to put into practice.) But take heart! If an invited-Finalist team cannot come to Stony Brook University for the Final, then you may be that next team selected as a Finalist.

 

Congratulations to all our Finalists!

I look forward to hearing from you in the coming days!

Once again, in no particular order, here are your 2018 Spellman High Voltage Electronics Clean Tech Competition Finalists!

 

Team Name	School	City	Country
MMCCleanTeam	Mount Maria College	Mitchelton	Australia
Air Water	Colegio Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the American School of Lima	Camacho, La Molina	Peru
5-ALA	George W. Hewlett High School	Hewlett	United States
Seq2Tran	Adrian Wilcox High School	Santa Clara	United States
NPSI	NPS International School	Singapore	Singapore
Hydrogen Fuel Cells	Plainview Old-Bethpage JFK High School	Plainview	United States
Eilise Ireland	Regina Mundi College	Douglas Road	Ireland
The Flash	National Junior College	Singapore	Singapore
Sustainable Future	Henry M. Gunn High School	Palo Alto	United States
PeaCeMakers	National Junior College	Singapore	Singapore

For all who have participated, know that you’re part of the biggest Clean Tech Competition in the Competition’s HISTORY! You’re part of the 39 different nations who registered teams! Teams from as far away as Turkey, Canada Fiji, Jamaica, Peru, Australia, Bulgaria, France, Singapore and South Africa submitted papers and took their shot to become a Semi-finalist! Yeah, that’s all the major continents or worldwide! 🙂 

You should be very proud of what you’ve accomplished simply by submitting your paper! You’re showing the world that you want to be part of the solution!

The judges had GREAT questions of me and the papers they had to score and had great comments regarding the papers such as the following:
1) The project focuses on changing human behavior to bring about change vs focusing on negating the negative impact poor choices are having on the environment.
2) The proposed application would be relatively easy to create and would carry little to no environmental cost.
3) The project plays to the human affinity for playing online games and proposes using the in app game as a secondary route to educate and reward good choices. It is very clever… And that was just one paper’s comments! As you can imagine with all the submitted papers I can’t list all the accolades but if you want to know what the judges had to say about yours, please email me at CleanTech@cstl.org.

Please help me congratulate all of our Semi-Finalists! They worked incredibly hard on their ideas and to simply be selected out of the biggest pool of papers ever, is an incredible achievement! I’ll be in touch more as the week goes on with our semi-finalists but for those who didn’t make it, take nothing but pride in your achievement! You entered, you found your problem, created a solution, wrote a paper, you stepped up to help! Your idea can help Solve Climate Change in hitherto unknown ways!

Semi-Finalists, welcome. Come Monday the 14th, you’ll find out if you’re on your way to Stony Brook University to showcase your idea. Try not to be nervous 🙂 I’ll be in touch. Congratulations to all our semi-finalists! 

Here they are in no particular order.

 

Team Name	School Name	Country
5-ALAGeorge	W. Hewlett High School	United States
Air Water	Colegio Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the American School of Lima	Peru
Eilise Ireland	Regina Mundi College	Ireland
MMCCleanTeam	Mount Maria College	Australia
NPSI	NPS International School	Singapore
Hydrogen Fuel Cells	Plainview Old-Bethpage JFK High School	United States
Seq2Tran	Adrian Wilcox High School	United States
The Flash	National Junior College	Singapore
Sustainable Future	Henry M. Gunn High School	United States
PeaCeMakers	National Junior College	Singapore
Team Coffee	RVHS	Singapore
xFarmSmart	XFARMSMART.ORG	United States
phytotoxins	G.W. Hewlett High School	United States
Flower Power	Jericho High School	United States
plasticgirls	National Junior College	Singapore
Imbak	Philippine Science High School Main Campus	Philippines
Dave Song	Gould Academy	United States
Algae2Energy	Hwa Chong Institution	Singapore
Rush Hour 4	EIB-The Victor Hugo School	France
Rainy_Ladies	National Junior College	Singapore
Refresh	Charles R. Drew Charter School	United States
Mansfield State High Team 2	Mansfield State High School	Australia
Invictus	NPS International School	Singapore
Litsy Luis Natani	Energy Institute High School	United States
MSSM Penguins	The Maine School of Science and Mathematics	United States
Cactopia	Anderson Junior College	Singapore
Mealworms Make Styrofoam Squirm	Anderson Junior College	Singapore
Team Thermodome	Jericho High School	United States
BPSHS-SRC Team B	Philippine Science High School – SOCCSKSARGEN Region Campus	Philippines
Microfuel	Hamilton High School	United States

Remember, if your team is an invited Finalist, your team must pay to get to Stony Brook University on the 12th of July.

Look for the Finalist announcement on the 14th!

Hi everyone! I watched as the papers came through and heard that the website ran slowly because SO MANY of you were trying to upload your paper very close to the deadline. Some even missed the deadline because they waited too long. I hope that in the future, you’ll all try to upload your paper at least a day before the deadline and not AT it. But I digress…

The judges were sent their assigned papers on the 17th and some have already started scoring! Each of the 270 papers that were submitted must be scored three times each so when you do the math that’s 810 total papers that must scored! Over the next two-plus weeks, our judges will be BUSY. Keep in mind many of them are preparing to administer final exams for the classes they teach (MANY are professors at universities around the world), juggling work and life related things. So if you get to work with one as a mentor, consider thanking them 😉 Without them, I’m just a guy with a collection of your papers. But what to do? 

Ugh! I don’t know about you but I hate it when I have to wait and there’s nothing I can do. 

Sometimes I get stressed, others I as cool as the other side of the pillow. I’m betting most of you are the former, I know I am. I find it very stressful waiting but if you’re like me, take heart, our judges are doing their job. You did yours, let’s try to relax and them do theirs. 

But what to do while you wait for May 7th when the semi-finalists are announced? Well I’m sure you have school work to do, fun to be had and chores that your parents are making you do. Go, do all of it but come back on the 7th, to this site to see if you’re a semi-finalist.

The judges will have their scores in by the 6th of May and I’ll be culling them down to the top 30 semi-finalists. From all the scores, the Semi-finalists will be announced  May 7 and those selected to the Final will be announced May 14. Both will be done here as well as with emails.

Now if any of the selected Finalist teams cannot make the Final, as has happened in the past, one of the 20 semi-finalists teams will be elevated to a position in the final. Teams ranking in places 11-15 may be named as Alternate Finalists. So if your team isn’t initially selected, try not to get too dejected, there is always the possibility of taking the place of a team who can’t go. 

Tom Petty was right when he sang “…the waiting’s the hardest part…” but good things come to those who wait. Who knows, maybe come the 7th, you’ll get an email from me stating you’re a semi-finalist?!

From there, if your team accepts a position in the Final, we’ll talk more and a decision will have to be made fairly quickly about whether or not your team will be heading to Stony Brook University to showcase your idea to our judges and to the world! But we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

So… try to be patient… It’s something I’m having to do as the judges continue to work on their papers but we’ll all get there together and it’ll be you who will show the world how you’re Solving Climate Change.

 

-Frank (Clean Tech Administrator)

Welcome to the 2018 Spellman High Voltage Electronics Clean Tech Competition! This is a brief post officially welcoming our registrants with some information and reminder for your team.

Info: For the competition, an acceptable form of communication is email and there are emails going out to the provided email address. Some are already being bounced back for various reasons like “…wasn’t found at gmail.com”. Please ensure that you speak with your team and make sure they know that CleanTech@cstl.org is not spam. Check your spam folders and make sure your email server knows it’s not spam as well. I’d hate to know you missed out on information because of your email. If you ever have questions you can email that email address or call me at +1-516-764-0045, I am in my office from 8:00am to 4:00pm (16:00) each Monday to Friday to answer questions. If you think there was a mistake please contact me and I can update my list.

Reminder: Your paper is due Friday April 13^th NO LATER than 4:00 PM (16:00) Eastern (New York) time in a PDF formatted file at this website. You only get one chance to upload your paper so make sure it is 100% EXACTLY how you want it before you submit it. No exceptions will be made.

More emails will be sent in the coming days and weeks, but like I said, please talk to your teammates and team leader to ensure all members are receiving my emails. I can also update the email addresses for your teams but you must contact me to do so.

Once again, welcome and good luck! I’m looking forward to seeing your paper come through. If you have questions do not hesitate to contact me.

Have a great day!

 

-Frank

…Registration is now closed.

 

Thank you to all who registered!

You are now part of something incredible! Something bigger than yourself, our planet and the care of it.

You should be proud of what you’re doing.

 

Keep in mind you may modify your registration until April 7th and your paper submissions are expected here on Friday March, 13th, by 4:00 PM (16:00). No exceptions will be made. Bear in mind you may only submit your paper in a PDF formatted file and you only get one chance to submit your paper. Ensure it’s exactly as you want it before you submit it. 

 

Best of luck to you all!

If this doesn’t ring a bell, that’s okay. Let me give you some knowledge before I make this incredible announcement! 

From the conference’s website: 

The Organizing Committee of the World Congress on Climate Change 2018: Impacts & Responses invites you to participate in the congress, which will be held on Sept 13-15, 2018 at Rome, Italy. The conference will be the culmination of a momentous twelve months in the climate debate and needs a breakthrough in the form of a roadmap for a future climate change deal. Early in the year, scientific evidence of global warming, as set out in the fourth assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), put the reality of human-induced global warming beyond any doubt. What we are facing is not only an environmental problem, but has much wider implications: For economic growth, water and food security, and for people’s survival – especially those living in the poorest communities in developing countries.

Climate Change 2018 is designed to bring together of leading academicians, scientists, researchers, graduate students from the field of Geosciences, geology, Meteorology, Volcanology, Atmospheric Science, Global Warming and Environmental Sciences. Discussions throughout the three days-long conference will culminate in the development of a new Action Strategy for Nature Conservation, guiding conservation efforts for the next 5 years.

 

*But Frank, you said there was an announcement.*

Yes I did and this is where you come in. In working with the Committee of the World Congress on Climate Change, they have invited the winning team to be guests at the conference! They’re even going to pay for your hotel! Now don’t worry about the costs of getting to and from Rome, we’re working on that as you read this, but in order to be there, you’ve got to be in the Competition!

Ever wanted to see Rome? Wanted to see the Colosseum? How about the Trevi Fountain or St. Peter’s Basilica? Piazza Navona or the Pantheon? (All are beautiful, I know, I’ve been there.) Well, get your team and register! The only way you stand a chance of seeing it and being a guest at the Conference is being part of Clean Tech with a paper submitted no later than April 13.

Oh yeah, another gift to you…We’ve extended the registration period not one but TWO weeks! Yup! It now going to close on March 30th! HURRY! Do not let this extension go to waste! Go to www.cleantechcompetition.org to register your team!!

First things first…

Can you believe it!? The registration deadline is almost here! March 16th will be here before you know it so if you haven’t already done so, go to www.cleantechcompetition.org to register! 

Just as a reminder, this is the registration deadline: March 16.

You do not have to submit your paper when you register but in order to submit that paper you MUST be registered by the Friday, the 16th of March. 

As another reminder, you’ll have just under a MONTH to write, proof and submit your paper because, it isn’t due until Friday, April 13th. Also, you only get one chance to submit your paper so make sure it is EXACTLY THE WAY YOU WANT IT TO BE before you submit it here.

Second things second…

I am thrilled to tell you that thanks to the efforts of your teachers and you the students, we now have more countries signed up than we did in 2017!  Here’s the list…SO FAR…because as you already know, registration doesn’t close for another 13 days: the Bahamas, Bulgaria, Canada, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, Fiji, France, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Jamaica, Lesotho, Malaysia, Moldova, Oman, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Portugal, Singapore, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, United States. Some of which (the ones in bold are participating for the first time in the history of Clean Tech! That’s 28 in case you didn’t want to count 😉 With your help disseminating, we’ll see even more, so help spread the word, tell your friends and neighbors, classmates and teacher, tell everyone you know who might be interested! Which brings me to…

Third things third…

If you’re on Facebook or Twitter, so is Clean Tech! It’s where you can get important information, contact me (as I run both accounts) and get announcements regarding the Spellman High Voltage Electronics Clean Tech Competition. You can even find Spellman’s Twitter and website if you’re interested in learning more about the technology behind their high voltage equipment…They do pretty incredible things there at their HQ, I know, I’ve seen it myself!

Last things last…

If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. Of all the things I am, husband, friend, astronomy fiend, Competition administrator, I’m not a mind reader. I can’t help until you ask for it, so don’t wait until the last minute. Have a question? Ask it. CleanTech@cstl.org or +1-516-764-0045

Best of luck! I can’t wait to see what you come up with!

 

Wonder. Create. Amaze.

Frank DiGiovanni
Spellman High Voltage Electronics Clean Tech Competition Administrator
Center for Science Teaching & Learning