A day of intense written, verbal and practical testing ended with Cate School senior Thanh-Liem Huynh-Tran taking top honors at the 2011 international Brain Bee neuroscience competition on Saturday in Florence, Italy.
The International Brain Bee is a nonprofit neuroscience competition for high school students. Directed by founder Dr. Norbert Myslinski of the University of Maryland, the Brain Bee is an attempt to motivate students to learn about the brain, to capture their imaginations and to inspire them to pursue careers in biomedical brain research.
There are about 70 local Brain Bee coordinators worldwide who conduct competitions annually. The winner of each local competition is invited to attend a National Brain Bee competition in his or her own country, and the winner of each National Bee is invited to compete in the international championship.
“TL (as he is affectionately known on the Mesa) “had the time of his life,” according to his mother, Le-Than Tran, who traveled to Italy with her son.
Noting the competition was very close, she said, “Winning was just icing on the cake. The kids made a Facebook group to chat before the competition, so by the time they got to Florence they already knew a lot about each other. When they parted on Saturday they were all so sad. It was the friendliest group of competitors I have ever seen.”
This year’s International Brain Bee competitors came from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, India, Korea, Poland, Nigeria, Italy, Romania, United Arab Emirates and Germany. Ages ranged from 14 to 18.
In addition to a large traveling trophy, which will be displayed at Cate School during the coming school year, TL received a personal trophy, a $3,000 prize and a summer internship with an esteemed neuroscientist.
Click here for more information about the Brain Bee competition.
— Leslie Turnbull is an administrator for Cate School.