7 Nassau students win at Long Island High School Psychology Fair

Seven Nassau County students have been named best-in-category winners for their presentations at the Long Island High School Psychology Fair.

More than 70 Long Island students submitted projects to the fair, which has served as a forum for student research in psychology since its inception in 2008. The top 36 entries were invited to be presented in six psychology categories -- biological, cognitive, developmental, health, interdisciplinary and social.

This year's winners were: Nicholas Furci, Jessica Futoran, Tiffany Sun and Nathan Yang of Roslyn High School; Sydney Schwartz of Plainview-Old Bethpage JFK High School; Jacob Mathai of Great Neck South High School; and Liz Muratore of Paul Schreiber High School in Port Washington.

"The projects this year were tremendous," said Allyson Weseley, secondary research coordinator at Roslyn High School, which hosted this year's fair. "The quality of projects has also increased as years go by."

Furci and Yang's project explored how a worker's gender impacts the perception of his or her behavior. For example, a disagreeable male worker was perceived as more intelligent and more likely to be promoted than his male counterparts, while disagreeable females were perceived as being less intelligent and less likely to be promoted.

Futoran explored how front-of-package nutrition information affects intent to purchase.

"The fair is one of the few research competitions where you have to get up in front of a room full of people and explain your entire project in a formal way," said Futoran, a senior.

Massapequa: Students get Chromebooks

Seventh- and eighth-grade students at Alfred G. Berner Middle School are receiving Chromebooks as part of a new initiative to host Web-based educational tools that will help children advance and succeed as 21st century learners, school officials said. Students will bring their assigned Chromebook to each class daily, as well as home, with parent approval.

Chromebooks are devices that run the Chrome web browser and automatically save work in a secure cloud-based environment managed by the district.

Distribution will take place over the next month, and the devices will then be collected in June and reissued in September. The program will expand to ninth-graders next school year and grades 10-12 in 2016.

"The students can communicate with each other and get immediate feedback from the teacher, which helps to customize learning for each student," Principal Jason Esposito said.

Seaford: Gym rededication honors alumni

Seaford High School hosted a gymnasium rededication last month to again honor eight alumni who lost their lives during the Vietnam War era as well as all district residents who have since died serving the country. The eight alumni were James Fowler, Steve Freese, Dan Gladding, James Heinbockel, John McNamara, Carl Nygren, Tom Peterson and Kenneth Vogel.

The event was held as part of the school's 21st annual Bob Gerbino Wrestling Night, which is named for the founder of Seaford's wrestling program.

"Bob was at the 1968 dedication and he would be very pleased that we are rededicating the gym in their honor and extending the honor to all community members," Seaford athletic director Tom Condon said.

Islandwide: PBS Kids contest

PBS Kids has announced it is accepting submissions for a contest in which children nationwide in grades K-3 can submit original stories with illustrations. To enter, kids can submit stories to local PBS stations and the local winners will be entered into the national round of judging, with national winners being announced in July.

Grades K-1 must not exceed 200 words, while grades 2-3 must not exceed 300 words, and entries must have at least five clear and colorful illustrations. Entries will be judged based on creativity and expression, story structure and illustration quality and originality.

Prize packages will include books from the "Arthur" series and personal technology items. The local deadline is March 31.

For more contest rules, visit pbskids.org/writerscontest.