Boothbay Region High School students Lilley Harris and Blake Erhard traveled to Bowdoin College for the 73rd annual Maine State Science Fair on March 23. Their submission – a shot cap which disguises needles to lower anxiety in pediatric patients – won first place for the biomedical and health sciences category.

Harris and Erhard also won Reach Awards which go out to submissions from schools that have not participated in the science fair at all or for several years and have performed exceptionally.

Because Erhard applied to the University of Maine in Orono, he won a four year, full tuition scholarship to the university and a research stipend for a subject of his choosing and automatic admissions to the Honors College. It was one of 12 such awards from UMaine. Harris would have received the same had she applied; instead, she hopes to attend Northeastern University in Boston this fall.

With 249 students from 35 schools across the state and 15 projects in their category, Erhard and Harris said they did not expect to see any prizes.

“We were getting the experience out of it, but we didn't expect to win any prizes,” said Harris. “When all the judges started talking to us, we had like nine judges and other groups had maybe three, we were like ‘Maybe we're going to get something.’”

“I wasn't really worried because I didn't think we were going to do that well,” Erhard said.

Other projects in their category were more related to the sciences of biomedical fields than the engineering aspects like their project, said Harris, like one which featured embryo stem cell treatment for cancer. The second place project was based on research of a chemical which kills the lungs’ epithelial cells.

The students said the judges were especially impressed they came up with the idea outside the classroom.

“They liked that we were friends who came up with this idea together versus two kids who got paired together by a teacher to do a project. This was our idea,” said Harris.

Harris and Gifted and Talented teacher Emily Higgins started talking in the fall of 2017 about potentially participating in the science fair, so Harris spent about a year coming up with the idea for the project. After speaking with the organization, Higgins learned science fair projects do not have to pertain to data-driven efforts in chemical, bioligical or physics-based sciences, that there is room for other aspects like engineering, computer science and more. Higgins attended a summer training session. Harris and Erhard began the paper process in October and were approved in February.

“I think one of the things that made them successful was their ability to work together and put their skills together,” said Higgins. “Lilley's idea wouldn't have been able to be produced without Blake's many years of time doing CAD. I think that's pretty key. Another piece of their success was that it was original and applicable.”

As college bound seniors unable to return to the fair next year to resubmit a new version of their project, Harris and Erhard said they still sense a future for their project.

Said Harris, “We are going to talk to some patent attorneys sometime in the next week. We've already started getting that process started.”