Damini O. ’29, Damisi O. ’29, and Divya P. ’29 won 1st Place in the Pennsylvania Society for Biomedical Research (PSBR) Digital Media 2025 Contest. Not only did they bring home the blue ribbon, but they also earned the top prize in the state among 6th – 12th Grade students. The trio created a video that demonstrated how biomedical research saves lives. According to PBSR, their project was required to “digitally demonstrate a superior understanding of the connection between their life and biomedical research (including the need for animals in that research).”

Middle School Science Department Head and Science Teacher Cory Eklund presented the opportunity to compete in this competition and the girls took no time getting their project together. As they said in their video, “Biomedical research is where science and medicine work together to improve our lives,” and they were fascinated to learn that years earlier, none other than Eklund himself had heart surgery. Thankfully he is completely healed due to the benefits of biomedical research.

For the award-winning video, the girls completed the research, developed content, and created an outstanding video that spoke about Eklund’s operation, kidney transplants and rejection, and vaccines. Damisi created animations, and Divya and Damini worked on editing and transitions. It was a great experience, not only from a scientific point of view, but it was also an introduction to the world of video creation.

If you asked, these students would unanimously raise their hands to do it all over again. Damisi, Damini, and Divya all agreed that working together was one of the best parts of the project. Damisi said, “We had lots of quality time together, and it was really funny when we messed up. We had to do a million retakes.”

Big congratulations go to Damisi, Damini, and Divya! They would like to deliver a special message to their teachers who helped them along the way. They said, “Ms. Mesones (Cristina Mesones, Middle School Spanish teacher) was our fantastic videographer throughout the month-long process of filming, and we are so grateful for her dedication, help, and support! We had so much fun filming, planning, making animations, and working on this not only for the completion, but also for helping the community in small but impactful ways. We are also grateful to Mr. Eklund for introducing us to this idea and supporting us, and we hope to do it again next year!” GA would also like to congratulate Alicia S. ’29, who was a finalist in the poster contest in this same competition.