Around 40 students and several professors volunteered as Mount Vernon middle school and high school students put their STEM knowledge to the test during the regional Science Olympiad.
For the sixth year, the Mount Vernon Community School District teamed up with Cornell to hold the regional event on Saturday, Feb. 22. Middle school and high school students compete in events that include earth science, biology, chemistry, physics, and engineering. Cornell hosted about half of the programming—14 events for about 200 high school teams—in Russell Science Center.
“We have a big, beautiful science building and a lot of lab space that they don’t have over at the middle or high school,” said Science Olympiad organizer and Cornell Professor of Chemistry Charley Liberko. “We also have quite a lot of students here who are really good about volunteering. The number of volunteer hours our students put in is really impressive.”
Senior Elin Kairies ’25, a biochemistry and molecular biology major, organized the student volunteer effort on behalf of Cornell. She says it’s really cool to see the event come together.
“I’m the president of Cornell’s Chemistry Club, and we offer to run it and help,” Kairies said. “It’s a great way for us to tie in with the community and have a bit more community involvement.”
Students involved in everything from the Engineering Club to football and Greek Life volunteered to help the young STEM-loving students on their big day.
“They are proctoring exams, watching the students, and giving them rules to make sure they’re doing everything safely,” Kairies said. “Student volunteers also go to the Middle School to score their work and give them their awards.”
The younger local students, from Iowa and other midwest states, got a taste of what it’s like to be in Cornell’s buildings and even walked away with some free Cornell merch. Perhaps these scholars will one day enroll at Cornell and volunteer to help other younger students in the community during the Science Olympiad, like Charley Liberko’s son, Mark Liberko ’26.
“Several of my own children have done Science Olympiad, and it was really formative for them,” Charley Liberko said. “It was a good event to get them diverse academic experiences and focus on problem-solving. It was so good that my son, who is a Cornell student now, supervised an event at the middle school today.”
The chemistry professor said it was a successful 2025 event, and he’s looking forward to next year. Winners from the Feb. 22 event will go on to compete in state and national Science Olympiad competitions.
