Kids show their knowledge at science fair

YOUNGSTOWN — A big concern for Brett Wilson is global warming and its potentially devastating consequences.

In that light, perhaps it’s not surprising that the Chaney High School freshman would choose that topic as the basis for his school science project.

“There’s so many problems in the world today,” Brett said. “There’s so many weather problems like Hurricane Katrina, drought and floods; the earth is out of whack.”

Brett, who is in Dennis Malaska’s science class, added that he’s read “An Inconvenient Truth,” the best-selling book by former Vice President Al Gore that talks about the disastrous effects of global warming. He’s also seen the movie of the same title.

So he conducted a series of experiments to test the correlation between planting more foliage and decreasing the causes of global warming. His conclusion was that areas devoid of greenery tend to have higher temperatures and humidity with higher amounts of ultraviolet rays being trapped — the ingredients for global warming.

Brett’s was one of dozens of science exhibits on display at Saturday’s annual Youngstown City Schools All-City Science Day competition in Youngstown State University’s Kilcawley Center. The program featured projects by city students in grades five through 12 whose experiments focused on everything from magnetism to paper towel absorbency.

For more, see Sunday’s Vindicator and Vindy.com