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Hi! My name is Sebastian. I’m a teenager of 18 years old having a genuine passion for science. Actually, this passion made me create this blog, focused mainly on…well …you get the point. During high school I participated at many international Olympiads, like IPHO, IJSO and IAO. Also, in my school, I have been teaching the new generations of students who share the same inclinations for science as I do. I decided to use these valuable experiences and attempt to make this domain more popular and help students around the world to understand some complex physics phenomena.

First of all, I’d like to share the 3 principles that guide me during study:

·         1) read stuff and get informed( the area of study is obvious)

·         2) ask question

·         3) ask more questions

These are the principles I follow, and I can say it worked pretty well for me. Of course, there is an unwritten principle: ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS... but you must be really stupid not to do so. That’s the spirit that guides a scientist: trust nothing until you check it! For example, when my physics teacher showed me the Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution, I asked her where did it come from( it is quite a peculiar formula). The fact that she didn’t know the answer did not stop me to seek it by myself. How?  By using the books and surprisingly, the internet.  The results of the study are published on this blog. Anyway, this effort paid well, since I got a comprehensive understanding of thermodynamics and statistics. Have you ever wondered where does PV= nRT come from? I must say that I am very proud that I know how to demonstrate it!( I’m proud, because it is not simple at all). Other times, after solving a problem that had a solution I could not agree with, I decided to reproduce the conditions stated in the text of the problem as accurate as possible. Many times it proved to be right to have doubts, sometimes I was wrong. For example, I discovered that the boiling at the separation surface between cooking oil and water didn’t take place when it was predicted. However, I managed to solve that mystery eventually.

I also want to discuss about Olympiads. Are they good after all? I am asking this because I heard various opinions on this subject. In order to make a brief summary of the discussions, I’ll simply list the pros and cons of going to the Olympiad

PROS:

·         The syllabus and problems of the Olympiad offer students the best guide( in my opinion) that young students can use in order to get a wide and clear view of physics( and maybe in other subject as well, but I can only use my experience)

·         The various problems and particular or general situations you encounter during your preparation and the solving “tricks” you learn help students to develop a superior thinking. I’ve observed this phenomenon and I must say that is really plausible: just as you train your muscles to get stronger, you can train your brain to get smarter!

·         By participating at international or even national level, you have the opportunity to meet various people from other regions and make a cultural exchange that can only have a positive impact on your character development. It is always a great pleasure to be a genuine ambassador of my country at the international contests and meet people from remote regions.

·         The emotional impact, the stress you experience while solving the subjects prepare you for life. Imagine what I feel before I get the exam papers: the effort I’ve made during the last months, even years will be tested during a few hours! Don’t blow it!.... By participating at the Olympiads, I learned how to control my emotions and obtain the highest level of concentration at a specific time.

·         Solving the problems require great mastery in writing. Thus, you develop a valuable ability of ordering your thoughts and expressing clearly on the paper and( also verbally)

·         For international participants: free trips to various countries, free food for one week, the closing party!!!...and ceremony

CONS:

·         Being successful at the Olympiad does not mean you are a great scientist. Olympiads exams have actually very little in common with the methods used in research. By participating at the Olympiad you might be so absorbed of the idea of solving problems and learning” solving tricks”, that you will focus more on solving problems, than on Physics itself.

·         Olympiads don’t predict accurately what students are smarter or have more knowledge. They are more like running contests, where speed is a very important factor to consider. What if you like to think slowly, and get more insight on a specific area? Or what if you are a faster thinker during the evening (like me), and not during the morning, when the contest is programmed? Well, bad for you! Also, a very important variable is the attention and also mastery of writing. You can lose precious points if you forget to note something or if you make a misfortunate miscalculation. I know a friend that took bronze medal instead of silver because he forgot to note that time was measured in seconds on the graph, although the unit was completely obvious from the previous lines he wrote. Was it fair? My opinion is that it is not. Too much accent is put on the rigorous writing. The greatest scientists were known for being more interested on the abstract ideas. Also, important discoveries had been made by accident, as a result of an uncaring method of working.

·         By following strictly the syllabus of the Olympiad, you tend to narrow your knowledge and decrease your curiosity to learn from more advanced scientific areas that are not included there. In extreme cases you might lose the interest in culture and society as well (sadly, I encountered people like that).

So, should a student go at the Olympiads after all? Yes, definitely! (but remember that I participate at Olympiads frequently, so I might be subjective). My advice however is to use the Olympiad as a guide to study Physics and develop a proper reasoning. Don’t ever make the Olympiad itself your final purpose. I know examples of students who did so, but after finishing high school they ended quite badly, without a job and with few perspectives. For example, I use the contest as opportunities to check my knowledge, visit places and meet new people. I told my physics teacher once, while she was upset that I didn’t pay enough attention to the contests: ” When I grow, I want to become a scientist, not an old Olympiad participant”.( of course the second thing is not even possible). So, my results at contest are due to my knowledge in physics and not due to a rigorous training for the subject themselves. I also learn a lot of things, like analytical mechanics, although they are useless for the contest.  Unfortunately, I lose many points because of my writing style. For example, at the international physics Olympiad in 2012, I took a bad result at the experimental task, because I was not prepared to do hundreds of measurements (otherwise simple) in just a few hours. Don’t understand me wrong, I’m not trying to find excuses, I’m just trying to emphasize some previous statements. Top results can be obtained by participants that didn’t make a rigorous training; that depends on the concentration capacity of the individual and innate ability to work fast and attentive in the same time.

                In conclusion, this blog is addressed to young high school students having a passion for science. I’ll try to use my experience and offer good advice for study some explanations of various interesting phenomena and fresh news from the scientific world.