Back to News Releases
Contact: Jennifer Forbes
Communications & Public Affairs
732-235-6356, jenn.forbes@umdnj.edu
Senior from West Windsor-Plainsboro High School Wins Central New Jersey Brain Bee Competition
at UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
PISCATAWAY, NJ – Renuka Reddy, a twelfth-grade student at West-Windsor Plainsboro High School, won the 2011 Central New Jersey Regional Brain Bee on Sunday, January 29, beating 18 other high school students who participated. In addition to a cash prize, Renuka received an expense-paid trip for two to compete in the National Brain Bee Competition at the University of Maryland in Baltimore, March 14-20, 2011, to coincide with Brain Awareness Week.
Modeled after a traditional spelling bee, the Brain Bee was a live question and answer competition in which students were quizzed about the human brain and central nervous system. During three rounds of competition, the contestants answered questions derived from the book Brain Facts, published by the Society for Neuroscience.
Douglas Judice, a tenth-grade student from North Huntington High School in Hampton, NJ, placed second and twelfth grader, Snehaa Krishnan, from South Brunswick High School, placed third. Participants included students from East Brunswick, Edison, Montgomery, Princeton, Sayreville, and Summit High Schools, among others.
Prizes were provided by the New Jersey Brain Bee Association, a non-profit organization set up to fund such events in our state. Additional sponsorship also was provided by the Office of the Vice President for Research at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. The event, held for the first time at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, was organized and judged by members of the Department of Neuroscience & Cell Biology.
About UMDNJ-ROBERT WOOD JOHNSON MEDICAL SCHOOL
As one of the nation’s leading comprehensive medical schools, UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School is dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in education, research, health care delivery, and the promotion of community health. In cooperation with Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, the medical school’s principal affiliate, they comprise New Jersey’s premier academic medical center. In addition, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School has 34 other hospital affiliates and ambulatory care sites throughout the region.
As one of the eight schools of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey with 2,800 full-time and volunteer faculty, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School encompasses 22 basic science and clinical departments, hosts centers and institutes including The Cancer Institute of New Jersey, the Child Health Institute of New Jersey, the Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Medicine, the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute, and the Stem Cell Institute of New Jersey. The medical school maintains educational programs at the undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate levels for more than 1,500 students on its campuses in New Brunswick, Piscataway, and Camden, and provides continuing education courses for health care professionals and community education programs. To learn more about UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, log on to rwjms.umdnj.edu. Find our fan page at www.Facebook.com/RWJMS and follow us on Twitter www.twitter.com/UMDNJ_RWJMS.
###
