In Second Year, Canton HS Science Olympians Among Top 10 In State

Canton High School

CANTON/STORRS, CT — Most associated Olympic competitions with running, jumping, throwing, and performing.

But 14 Canton High School students recently competed and did well as part of the school's fledgling Science Olympiad team, performing science, technology, math, and engineering tasks with their brains.

On March 22, CHS students traveled to the University of Connecticut in Storrs to compete in the 2025 State Finals for the Science Olympiad.

This is only Canton’s second year with a Science Olympiad team, joining 25 other schools from across the state.

Each school has from September to March to prepare for challenges across 23 wide-ranging, STEM events.

Over a dozen districts fielded two squads, and two schools fielded three.

Overall, there were 42 teams of up to 15 students cranking out science knowledge for six straight hours across the campus of UConn.

Canton’s team graduated a couple of key seniors from last year’s inaugural team, but still grew to nearly a full roster (14 students) compared to last year’s original eight.

This allowed Canton to compete in all 23 events, and the results were what they had hoped — top 10 in the state at ninth out of 26 schools.

Some of the highlight winners were:

• Gold medal in "Robot Tour" with Adam Drefs and Jayden Lin.

• Fourth-place in "Wind Power" with Drefs and Annie Lynch

According to CHS, there were also top-10 finishes in six events:

• "Air Trajectory" —Lucas Mainville, Alex Orschel, Shane Leadbetter

• "Electric Vehicle" — Adam and Lin.

• "Entomology" — Annie Lynch and Corinne Lynch

• "Fossils" — Jasmine Allen-Sengupta and Fiona Meehan

• "Materials Science" — Mainville and Joshua Miller

• "Tower" — Miller

"Each year, many events within Olympiad will change, although most repeat for at least two years, while others seem to last for over a decade," wrote CHS in an announcement.

" The official rules come out every September, and schools can start the preparation process."

Some of the events in this year’s Science Olympiad included: Anatomy & Physiology, Wind Power, Materials Science, Robot Tour, Chemistry Lab, Forensics, Astronomy, Code Busters, Forestry, Dynamic Planet, Tower, Helicopter, Optics & Disease Detectives.

Canton’s full roster includes: Seniors: Fiora Moakley and Joshua Miller; Juniors: Jasmine Allen-Sengupta, Marya Lane, Lucas Mainville, and Alex Orschel; Sophomores: Adam Drefs, Davud Mammadov, Annie Lynch, and Shane Leadbetter; Freshmen: Corinne Lynch, Fiona Meehan, Cole Cottingham, and Jayden Lin.

Science Olympiad at CHS is coached by physics teacher Eric Tucker, who attributes much of Canton’s success to the strong science department K-12 in addition to the support of Marsha Mastrocola (department chair at CHS) and several "super-supportive parents."

Other critical support came from CHS Tech Teacher Brandon Richard, retired Farmington astronomy teacher Marty Connors, and past CHS graduate Carter Gay.

CHS Olympiad is aiming for a full 15-student team next year, and student captains will determine the performance goals for 2025-26.