News
March 24, 2016Ross-Pilkington from Doane Stuart School to Compete at National Brain Bee
Jack Ross-Pilkington ’17 has had a very busy two weeks. The Doane Stuart junior from Stuyvesant Falls recently placed first at the Inaugural Albany Medical Center Brain Bee, hosted by The Center for Neurosciences and Neuropharmacology. His prize for emerging victorious over 40 students from 14 different private and public high schools in the Capital District is a fully-funded trip to Baltimore this weekend to compete in the Ninth USA National Brain Bee Championship.
Jack, isn’t working on this alone, though. He has a few experts in his corner, helping him prepare to compete against some of the best young neuroscience minds in the country. For Jack, the assistance has been indispensable: “I am honored to be working with Dr. Annalisa Scimemi, Assistant Professor of Biological Sciences at the University at Albany. She is helping me review the anatomy of the brain as well as how to diagnose and treat disorders. Both of these are categories I will be tested on. She is basically having me work on the material that would be covered in a college-level Intro to Neuroscience course.”
Jack also gives high praise to Dr. David Wells, Biology Teacher at Doane Stuart, previously an Associate Professor in the Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, Yale University. “The Biology program here has us very well-prepared, especially Advanced Biology, which approaches things from a neuroscience perspective. I meet with Dr. Wells nearly every Monday and Friday at lunch. He has helped a lot with the actor thing; how to differentiate the diseases (one of the tasks requires competitors to diagnose actors presenting with different diseases). He has given me advice on certain signs to look for – different tricks of the trade.”
Jack is one of 53 competitors from the continental US and Alaska. He is one of four from New York State, the other three representing schools in Buffalo, White Plains, and NYC. 30,000 students will compete internationally. The winner of the US Championship will earn a fully-funded trip to Copenhagen, Denmark in July to compete at the International Brain Bee, sponsored by The Federation of European Neuroscience Societies.
