Abstract
The goal of our ongoing research is to identify strengths and weaknesses of high school level science fair and improvements that might enhance student learning outcomes. During 2017 and 2018, a national cohort of more than 300 high school students from Texas and several other states completed anonymous and voluntary surveys containing quantitative and open-ended text questions about their science fair experiences. We learned that ~60% of the students said they were interested in a career in the sciences or engineering. Also, ~60% overall said that participating in science fair increased their interest. Students who said science fair increased their interest were more motivated, more likely to have had help from teachers, and more likely to have received coaching. About two-thirds of the students were required to participate in science fair, and that requirement decreased markedly the frequency of students who said that science fair increased their interest in science or engineering. In the worst case, ~10% of the students who said that they were required to participate in science fair and uninterested in science engaged in research misconduct (i.e., plagiarism and making up their results). Students’ positive comments about competitive science fair focused on the competition incentive, whereas their positive comments about non-competitive science fair focused on learning about the scientific process and learning in general. We discuss the findings in the context of NSTA guidance that science fair participation should be voluntary.