Congratulations on your interest in the Science Fair!  This page is intended to help guide students through the process of submitting a project.  It is important that you work closely with a Teacher or Parent Sponsor to ensure your project is ready to compete.

Key Terms:

• Research – refers to library research and information gathering. 
• Experimentation – refers to work done in the field or laboratory after forming hypotheses.

NOTE: Optional display templates are available on the Project Display Information Page. Examples are available for scientific and engineering / computer science projects at the middle school and high school levels. These templates give an overview of the information judges will want to see about your project.

Getting Started

1. Pick Your Topic – Get an idea of what you want to study.  Ideas might come from hobbies or problems you see that need solutions.  Limit your topic, as you have little time and resources.  You may want to study only one or two specific events.  Review the Rules page and follow the applicable ISEF requirements/forms.
2. Research Your Topic – Go to the library and read everything you can on your topic.  Observe related events.  Gather existing information on your topic.  Look for unexplained and unexpected results.  At the same time, talk to professionals in the field, write to companies for information, and obtain or construct needed equipment.
3. Science Projects: Organize And Theorize – Organize everything you have learned about your topic.  At this point you should narrow down your hypothesis by focusing on a particular idea.  Your library research should help.
   Engineering and Computer Science Projects: Organize and Define Your Design Goal – Organize what you’ve learned about your topic, and use this information to identify what need you want to address.  Clearly state your Design Goal.
4. Make A Timetable – As you narrow down your ideas, remember to choose a topic that not only interests you, but can be done in the amount of time you have. Get out a calendar to mark important dates (See the Schedule page for important dates for this year’s fair).
   • Make sure to leave a week to fill out the necessary forms and to review your Research Plan with your Sponsor. 
   • Some projects need approval from the Scientific Review Committee (SRC) before they are started, so be sure to allow time for that process. 
   • Give yourself plenty of time to experiment and collect data – even simple experiments do not always go as you might expect the first time, or even the second time. 
   • After you have finished your experiments, you will probably need a few weeks to write a paper and put together an exhibit.
5. Science Projects: Plan Out Your Research – Once you have a feasible project idea, you should write out a research plan.  This plan should explain how you will do your experiment and exactly what it will involve.  Any student participating in the Science Fair is required to complete the Research Plan, Approval Form and Checklist.
   Engineering and Computer Science Projects: Plan Out Your Testing:
   • Establish Design Criteria: Design criteria are requirements that help you develop your product/program and determine the extent to which the final product/program meets your stated design goal.
   • Plan Out Preliminary Design(s): Explain the steps you will first take to meet your design goal.  For example, you may build multiple prototypes or write two or three completely different computer programs that go about reaching your design goal in different ways.  
   • Develop a Test Plan: Decide how you will test your prototypes or computer code and what variables you will measure to evaluate how successful it is at meeting your design goal.
   • Complete the Research Plan, Approval Form and Checklist.
6. Consult Your Adult Sponsor – You are required to discuss your Research Plan with your Adult Sponsor and get his/her signature of approval.  Your sponsor should review your Research Plan and determine if you need any additional forms and/or SRC approval.
7. Once you’ve reviewed the rules and know whether SRC/IRB approval is required, you are ready to register for the fair.
8. Science Projects: Conduct Your Experiments – Give careful thought to designing your experiments.  As you conduct your research and experiment, keep detailed notes of each and every experiment, measurement, and observation.  Do not rely on memory.  Remember to change only one variable at a time when experimenting, and make sure to include control experiments in which one of the variables are changed.  Make sure you include sufficient numbers of test subjects in both control and experimental groups.
   Engineering and Computer Science Projects: Build and test the first version of your product or computer program. Keep detailed notes of any problems with your product / program, and follow your test plan to evaluate how successful your product / program is at meeting your design goal.  Use the information from this testing to decide what improvements you can make to come closer to meeting your design goal. 
9. Science Projects: Examine Your Results – When you complete your experiments, examine and organize your finding.  Did your experiments give you expected results?  Why or why not?  Was your experiment performed with the exact same steps each time?  Are there other causes that you had not considered or observed?  Were there errors in your observations?  Remember that understanding errors and reporting that a suspected variable did not change the results can be valuable information.
   Engineering and Computer Science Projects: Redesign and Retest – Use the results from your testing to make changes to your product design or computer program.  Re-test the new version, and measure its performance with your test plan.  Repeat this step multiple times to get as close as you can to meeting your design goal.  Keeping an accurate and detailed record of this part of the project is essential to a high-caliber project.
10. Science Projects: Draw Conclusions – Which variables are important?  Did you collect enough data?  Do you need to do more experimenting?  Keep an open mind – never alter results to fit a theory.  Remember, if your results do not support your original hypothesis, you still have accomplished successful scientific research.  An experiment is done to prove or disprove a hypothesis.
    Engineering and Computer Science Projects: Evaluate your final program or product – How close did you come to meeting your design goal?  Which changes made the most impact towards reaching your design goal?  What ideas do you have that could further improve your product or program?  In your presentation, discuss the final product, its usefulness, and the process you used to develop it.

NOTE: The Engineering and Computer Science Project steps above are adapted from https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-fair-projects/competitions/engineering-programming-project-tips

For more information concerning rules or general science fair questions, contact the fair Director.