Students from three high schools joined undergraduate students and faculty members from the Farquhar College of Arts and Sciences at NSU for the second annual South Florida Psychology Bowl on Apr. 7, co-hosted by the college and Cypress Bay High School’s Psi Alpha Beta psychology honor society.
Participating in the Psychology Bowl were students from Cypress Bay, Plantation, and Stranahan high schools. The event featured a poster session of student research and literature reviews, as well as a Jeopardy!-style trivia tournament among five-person teams from each of the high schools. Cypress Bay’s team took home the Psychology Bowl trophy for winning the single-elimination tournament.
The event also featured a luncheon, where students from NSU’s Psychology Club conversed with the high school students about life in college. Several NSU students also served as judges for the poster session and moderators for the trivia tournament.
Faculty organizers for the Psychology Bowl were Jaime Tartar, Ph.D., associate professor and coordinator of psychology research in the college; Jonathan Banks, Ph.D., assistant professor in the college; and Kimberly C. Patterson, Ed.S., from Cypress Bay High School. Participating NSU students included Jaibel Makiyil, who helped organize the event, Alexandra Antunes, Alicia Deshazer, Faria Fatmi, Jaclyn Khan, Marissa Kurtzer, Basmatu Manchau, and Christina Perez.
“The Psychology Bowl was a great experience not just for the students, but for NSU’s Psychology Club volunteers as well,” said Makiyil. “It was great to mentor the students who made research posters and to advise them on creating posters for next year. It made us feel proud that high school students were so interested and intelligent about psychology when we watched them in the Jeopardy!-style tournament. We’re excited that so many high school students are as enthusiastic as we are about the field of psychology!”