School bulletin: Local students take top honors national, international contests

Students from a trio of Ventura County high schools won national and international honors this month.

In what's believed to be a county first, Thousand Oaks High School junior Emily Bryant showed her science fair project at the Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair in Houston, Texas from May 14-19.

Bryant qualified for the international fair, which gathered 1,600 projects from 64 countries and 49 states, via the county's science fair in March. She was the first county student to do so, according to the Ventura County Office of Education, which runs the county fair.

Her project, a study on public attitudes toward drone-delivered emergency medical care, brought home a second place special prize sponsored by the CIA.

Bryant said her research was inspired by her own experience watching her father injured in a life-threatening snowboarding accident. First responders told her they could take up to 30 minutes to arrive on scene.

"His life was in my hands," she said.

Drones could help speed up emergency responses in situations like heart attacks, where victims need equipment like defibrillators as soon as possible.

Courtroom artist

Ella Ochoa, a junior at Channel Islands High School, was named the top courtroom artist at the National High School Mock Trial Championships May 18-20 in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Ochoa, 17, won the county's courtroom artist contest before taking second at the state level competition in March. She was selected to represent California at the national contest after the artist she finished behind withdrew.

It was the Ochoa's first year in the competition, which requires artists to pull together illustrations of courtroom scenes as teams compete in two- to three- hour mock trial rounds. She said she'll be back again next year.

Rocket champs

A five-person rocketry team from Oak Park High School won a special rocket-building challenge during The American Rocketry Challenge in The Plains, Virginia on May 20.

The team of Evan Chau, Nicki Svetlov, Aadit Agarwal, Matthew Horowitz and Sophie Picard was one of 101 to qualify for the national championship. The team didn't make a first-round cut in the main competition, which asks teams to dial rocket launches in to a precise height and duration, but did take top honors in a timed contest to build a new rocket from scratch.

Isaiah Murtaugh covers education for the Ventura County Star in partnership with Report for America. Reach him at isaiah.murtaugh@vcstar.com or 805-437-0236 and follow him on Twitter @isaiahmurtaugh and @vcsschools. You can support this work with a tax-deductible donation to Report for America.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: School bulletin: Local students take top prizes or art, science, more