Albuquerque hosts national ‘Junior Science and Humanities Symposium’

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Hundreds of STEM students from across the country were in Albuquerque this weekend for a huge science competition, where they come up with creative solutions to today’s big problems.

"It’s an amazing opportunity for high school students to conduct and present original scientific research,” said Andrea Malenya, JSHS Project Manager.

From chemistry to environmental science, and physics to computers, students beat out others in regionals to get here.

But competitor Sherwin Thiyagarajan didn’t have to go very far, he’s a senior at Albuquerque School of Excellence. His project mixes computer science and basketball, to model scores.

"I’m a basketball player, I’ve played for my school for six years. Essentially it’s my passion, it’s the thing that I use to escape from other stressors. I wanted to do some research about basketball in order to have fun with it and to learn," said Thiyagarajan.

"These kids are incredible smart and have amazing ideas on what can be done, a lot of times I feel like they’re identifying those gaps," said Malenya.

If you want to get involve or if you want your high school student to learn more about this, visit, the Junior Science and Humanities Symposium’s website for more information.