The 17th annual Central Massachusetts Regional Brain Bee is taking place over two weekends in March and includes a virtual qualifying round and an in-person final at UMass Chan Medical School.
The competition features local high school students interested in neuroscience careers answering questions on nervous system anatomy, function and diseases; and diagnosing several disorders of the nervous system from written descriptions.
Students will be competing for the Andrew Sheridan Young Neuroscientist Award, established by Michael and Shirley Sheridan, in honor of their late son, Andrew, who had a passion for neuroscience. The winner of the award and a parent or guardian will also be awarded an all-expense paid trip to participate in the 2023 USA National Bee at the University of California-Irvine in April.
The qualifying round is being held virtually on March 11 via Zoom. The exam consists of true/false, multiple choice and short-answer questions drawing primarily from a primer on the nervous system, Brain Facts.
The students with the 10 best scores following the qualifying round will compete in the Brain Bee finals at UMass Chan on March 18 at 1 p.m. in the Albert Sherman Center auditorium. This year’s final will be the first in-person Brain Bee competition since 2020.
The competition is free and open to all Central Massachusetts high school students in grades 9 to 12. Registration is open until March 9.
The Brain Bee is sponsored by the Departments of Neurobiology and Psychiatry and the NeuroNexus Institute at UMass Chan.
