The Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell and the biology department of the Hofstra College of Liberal Arts and Sciences hosted the fourth annual Long Island Brain Bee competition on Sunday, Feb. 2. Fifty-four students between the ages of 14 and 18 traveled from high schools across Long Island and New York City to participate in a series of exams and faculty presentations over a seven-hour period.
“The purpose of the [Brain Bee] is to expose young scholars to the brain, to neurobiology and to careers that they can have in the neuroscience field,” said Jessica Santangelo, a biology professor.
There were two main segments of the Long Island Brain Bee. First, high school students were administered a written exam with questions based on the Society for Neuroscience’s book “Brain Facts: A Primer on the Brain and Nervous System.”
In the afternoon, the students took a laboratory exam using the structure labs in the School of Medicine. The students were tasked with identifying different parts of the brain.
The combined results of these tests were used to determine the top three scorers in the local competition.
In between the two tests, the high schoolers participated in educational and engaging activities, including games such as medical charades and a presentation delivered by Joel N.H. Stern, an associate professor of molecular medicine, neurology, surgery and science education at Hofstra’s School of Medicine. Stern discussed his research involving autoimmune diseases.
“I’ve always been interested in the brain,” said Asureel Mehaboob, a sophomore at Sachem High School East. “I’m a huge fan of competitions, and I also want to be a neurosurgeon when I get older.”
Mehaboob also noted that he learned about “neurodegenerative diseases, many deadly brain diseases and research that is being done to help people with these diseases.”
Dara Neumann, a sophomore at Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School, is “hoping to go into neurosurgery, specifically trauma-based” when she gets older.
The winner of the 2020 Brain Bee was Sheryl Lin, a high school senior at Island Trees High School.
Lin will attend the USA Brain Bee Championship at Northeast Ohio Medical University in Rootstown, Ohio from March 27-29, 2020.
Neumann and Hannah Quintin, who also represented Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School, finished in second and third place respectively, continuing the high school’s three-year streak of top Brain Bee performers.
A group of Hofstra neuroscience undergraduates explained that the Long Island Brain Bee allows them to provide new learning opportunities for local high school students.
“It’s a way, from a medical student perspective, to engage in topics that students are interested in, like neuroscience and neurology,” said Alex Landau, a first-year medical student at Hofstra’s School of Medicine. “It’s also a way for faculty to participate and engage with the community and perhaps future doctors and researchers.”
“It is important [to us] to provide opportunities for our community to participate in our university, and this is one way for us to do that,” Santangelo said. “This directly impacts young people in the community and shares with them all that Hofstra and the School of Medicine [have] to offer.”
