On Sunday, December 16, all of the Honors Biology students went to the Muth Interpretive Center to present a project that they had been working on all semester long. In the beginning of the year, each student paired up with another student in the same class. The pair then chose an animal that was classified as an endangered animal; they prepared a solution, a presentation, an essay, and drew a model for their animal. Each group of two presented to everyone in their class and at the end of the class, everyone voted on their top five favorite ideas.

The five groups with the most votes in each class moved onto the next round; all of the groups who weren’t chosen could join with one of the five groups in which they thought was the best idea. The new teams were to improve their solution, create a new model, and make a trifold poster. At the end of all of the preparing, all the teams were ready to go to the judging.

The team whom won would be implemented in California for their animal. At the Muth Interpretive Center, each judge was assigned three different groups to look at. Then, each judge chose the best of all three of the teams. After all of the judges went around one by one to each of the teams that were chosen. Finally, all of the judges took time to discuss which project would be the best to implement within California.

The group that came in first place was Pierce Hemphill, Jack Spraker, Sam Thompson, Conrad Meyer, Andrew Bertoia, and Maxym Krykunenko with their animal as the Elf Owl. Their solution was a bird box that had spines made of toothpicks to mimic their natural habitat. The class in which the first-place team was in would win extra credit. Each of the teams were congratulated because of all the hard work that they put into this project throughout the semester.