IB Group 4 Students Combine Research with Collaboration

On Monday December 5, the IBG4 science students showed off some serious science chops at the annual IB Group 4 Science Symposium! 

All IB students were required to complete a research experiment as members of a collaborative team. They designed experiments, conducted research, and interpreted the results in order to answer a scientific question–just as real scientists do.

The International Baccalaureate Group 4 (IBG4) Project encourages understanding of the relationship between various scientific disciplines and the scientific method while also emphasizing the idea of science as a group activity performed by teams. Through these collaborative and multidisciplinary projects, students appreciate the social, environmental, and even ethical implications of scientific discovery. 

“Part of its design is to demonstrate to students that in real life, all of scientific research is a group activity that requires collaboration, cooperation and teamwork,” explained Science teacher Becky Hutchins, who oversaw many of the projects, and organized the Symposium event. 

“I learned a lot from this project,” reflected Noori Nagra ’25. “Because the groups were randomly assigned, I was challenged to get to know a new group of people and learn how to collaborate well on a complicated project. I had to work with my group to produce an interesting question, a method of data collection, and how to interpret our results together.” 

Each year, there is a central theme–aimed to unite the projects across disciplines and help inspire students as they develop research ideas. This year’s theme, Movies, inspired a list of exciting research proposals. 

Students like Shane Vogel ’24 used the theme to to think outside the box. “My group members suggested doing an experiment on bird populations based on the animated movie Rio,” he explained. “A lot of our time was spent in the classroom designing our procedure, organizing our data, and creating our poster, while only about two hours were spent outside actually doing the experiment.” 

“It can be very hard for students to learn to work in a team to develop a research question, collect and analyze data and then create a finished product that incorporates all of their ideas and input. But, somehow they do all of this in ten hours!” Becky added. 

The symposium is the final part of the project where students share their findings with the larger community and practice talking about their research. 

Here are the dynamic topics represented at the IB Group 4 Science Symposium. 

• Study on the Impacts of Plant Diversity on Soil Fertility
• Noise Pollution: The Effect on Birds
• Comparison of Flooded Soils vs. Upland Soils
• Correlation Between the Diversity of Plants in a Given Habitat and the Diversity and Abundance of Terrestrial Invertebrates
• Soil Insects Near Water and Buildings
• The Effect of Human Disturbance on Soil pH and Fertility 
• Foot Traffic and Flying Insect Populations
• The Influence of Water Depth on Macroinvertebrates 
• Murder Mystery: Fruit Ninja
• Strawberry DNA: Dawn vs Ulta
• Bungee Jumping Fun
• Magnets Falling Through a Copper Tube
• The Relationship between Mass and Tension
• How Does the Surface Area of Parachutes Affect Their Flight Time?

Thank you to all of the IBG4 science students and the Science Department for a great evening celebration of research, experimentation, and thoughtful scientific work!