Science Festival 2018

Contibutor: Nabila Delyana

Bandung, 25th October 2018 – As an annual event organized by Student Association of International Program on Science Education (SA-IPSE), Science Festival is held again this year with theme “The Chronicles of Science: The Voyage of Science Throughout Centuries”. Science Festival 2018 took place in FPMIPA Building on Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia (UPI) Bumi Siliwangi, Bandung. For this event, all middle school students in West Java were invited to participate. Around West Java, there is not many event that focused on science. And so, Science Festival is conducted to develop both the students’ soft and hard skills in science, and grow their interest in science. In Science Festival 2018, there were three science competitions that students can join, which were: Science Quiz, Science Project, and Science Story Telling. Not only competitions, students can also experience various fun science experiments on Science Exhibition conducted by students of IPSE (International Program on Science Education).

Science Festival 2018 was held in 25th October 2018 for one day. The event was started by opening ceremony where Mr. Ikmanda Nugraha M. Pd., our student advisor, and Dr. Dadi Rusdiana M. Si., 3rd vice dean of FPMIPA UPI, gave their greeting speeches in JICA Auditorium. After the opening, Science Festival 2018 was officially started and all students are immediately guided to mobilized to their competition rooms. For Science Quiz, the competition was held in JICA Auditorium, while Science Project and Science Story Telling were held in FPMIPA B Building, specifically Dry Lab and B203 room respectively.

First, there is Science Project, which is a competition where a small group of students from the same school compete with other groups in the same themed project. For this year Science Festival, the theme was electrical generator. The students then had to presented their project in front of the judges and tested their final product. If the project was successful and innovative, it will get high score. There were three judges for this competition, Dr. Eka Cahya Prima, M. T., Mr. Muhammad Gina Nugraha, M. Pd., M. Si., and Mr. Duden Saepuzaman, M. Pd., M. Si. The winner of Science Project this year was Mts Asih Putera.
The second competition is Science Story Telling. Just like the title, in this competition the students individually did storytelling using English in front of the judges. The theme for Science Festival 2018 was favorite scientist. The students were not restricted to use any types of media to support their storytelling. They were allowed to freely expressed their storytelling. The fluent and interesting the students’ storytelling, the higher the score will be. The judges for this competition were Ms. Mary Margaret Thomas, M. Sc., Ph. D., Lilit Rusyati, S. Pd., M. Pd., and Iffianti Azka Atsani, S. S. For this year, Science Story Telling was won by a student from Taruna Bakti Junior High School.

Last but not least, there is Science Quiz, a sequences of quizzes in science. For this competition, the students from the same school were grouped together by three persons and compete with other groups. There were three rounds in this year’s Science Quiz. The first round was completing multiple choice science questions in an answer sheet. The top eight groups with highest score were through the semifinal, where they competed to answer most science questions read by the reader correctly. The four groups with the highest score in semifinal were passed to the final. In the final, the four groups still competed as before, but the system was the first to push the bell would be the one able to answer. This year, the competition was supervised and judged by Mr. Nanang Winarno, S. Pd., S. Si., M. Pd., Mr. Ikmanda Nugraha M. Pd., and Mrs. Eliyawati, S. Pd., M. Pd. Group B of Taruna Bakti Junior High School won this year’s Science Quiz.

Science Exhibition in Science Festival 2018 provided three stands this year, which were biology, chemistry, and physics. Students were taken to a short journey of becoming a scientist in this activity. In biology stand, the students could try and use microscope to observed tissues of living things, and observed and compared various preserved plants. Chemistry stand showcased fun experiments like lava lamp, distillation, and many more. There were a lot of displays in physics stand, such as telescope, robots, miniature of seismograph, mirrors and lenses, and pendulum.

Overall, Science Festival 2018 went relatively well and smooth, with the support of all IPSE lecturers, members of SA-IPSE, and the students from IPSE batch 2018. The students were pretty excited and competitive. Hopefully, Science Festival 2018 will be a memorable experience for all of the participants, and the party involved. We wish for a better and more exciting Science Festival 2019, gained more attention for the event, and whole lot participants from many middle schools in all over West Java.