ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, May 18, 1996 TAG: 9605200022
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: DUBLIN
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER STAFF WRITER
Four Southwest Virginia Governor's School students brought back awards from the Virginia State Science Fair this year.
Some awards were from the fair and others from organizations recognizing student work with special awards.
Brian Newman, who commutes to the Governor's School from Fort Chiswell High School in Wythe County, won a Virginia Dental Association award for his chemistry project along with honorable mention from the fair itself and in U.S. Army awards competition. Kristin Ayers, a student from Carroll County Intermediate School, also won an honorable mention Army award.
Shannon Hughes, a Governor's School student from Carroll County High School, won a fair physics award and third place in Institution of Electrical and Electronics Engineering awards.
Amanda Alley, who attends Governor's School from Pulaski County High School, took second place in Hills Pet Products awards.
Winning students representing other schools from the region were Sarah Davis, Carroll County High, behavioral and social sciences honorable mention from the fair and an award given by the Central Intelligence Agency, and Kelly Seaton, Dayspring Christian Academy, honorable mention from the American Water Works Association.
Governor's School students whose projects won top awards at the Blue Ridge Regional Science Fair at New River Community College in March did not bring back any awards from the International Science & Engineering Fair earlier this month in Tucson, Ariz., as they had for the past five years.
Pat Duncan, the school's director, said they were disappointed "but we assured them that they were winners just by being able to go" on the basis of awards in the preliminary science fair competition.
She told the Governor's School board at its meeting Thursday that 52 of the school's students had been accepted to present science papers at the annual Virginia Junior Academy of Science next week, held this year at Virginia Commonwealth University. They will leave Tuesday, read their papers Wednesday and attend an awards ceremony Thursday.
Ninety-five juniors and seniors from Pulaski, Giles, Floyd, Carroll, Wythe, Bland and Smyth counties and the city of Galax have been accepted so far at the Governor's School for next year, leaving only five spots still to be filled. The state has approved up to 100 students at the school each year.
John Wenrich, who is working with the Governor's School Internet program, reported four more schools in Giles County hooked onto Internet access through the Governor's School in the past month, for a total of eight so far in the school's service region.
Usually, software costing up to $50 per computer is necessary to block access to Internet sites which schools judge as having no educational value, he said. But the software provided through the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in a project for the Governor's School allows that to be done on the server side with no additional software necessary.
Wenrich estimated that about 1,400 such sites have had to be blocked, because they contain such data as pornographic material, destructive information such as how to make bombs, and similar kinds of data.
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