That's pretty amazing, considering only seven students from across North Carolina are in the regional finals. They join a total of 96 students in defending and discussing their research.
Regional winners will advance to the national finals.
But perhaps we should not be surprised at the strong showing of NCSSM in the competition, the top science-technology event for high school students. After all, the school tis designed to be home to the best and the brightest math and science students in North Carolina.
A unique two-year residence school for those top students, it is no stranger to doing well in the Siemens competition. In fact, last year the national team title went to NCSSM students Sajith M. Wickramasekara and Andrew Y. Guo. NCSSM students also won in 2001 and 2004.
The 2008 winners received the award for their work on drug efficacy versus drug toxicity. In reporting on the award, The Herald-Sun's Matt Goad wrote that "with additional study, their work could help chemotherapy target genes in tumors while not hurting cells elsewhere in the body."
That is pretty heady work for teenagers still in high school.
But it is the norm at the science and math school.
Take, for example, the research by one of this year's contenders in the regional finals, Lanair Lett. He has designed a project to learn more about how a certain gene can contribute to insulin production, a possible breakthrough in treating diabetes -- a disease both Lett and his mother have.
Lett also personifies what we think is so vital about the specialized school, one of the legacies in this state to the vision of former governor Terry Sanford. He was recruited and is supported by the N.C. Project SEED, a year-round program that places talented disadvantaged North Carolina high school students from all over the state, in academic, industrial and government research laboratories.
"I don't come from a very privileged school, to say the least," Lett, who attended Southern Vance High School, told The Herald-Sun's Matthew Milliken last week. "And so I've really enjoyed the experience. I never saw myself doing research as a high school student."
Providing that sort of experience to talented high school students is the hallmark of the N. C. School of Science and Math..
