A learning experience for life
Tobias Washeim, Rasmus Thoft Nygaard, Kristian Katholm Nielsen and Sebastian Lykke Dalsgaard from Egaa Gymnasium in Denmark won a golden ticket to the Stockholm Junior Water Prize competition when they participated in the Danish youth science competition Unge Forskere (Science EXPO) with a project on detecting microplastics in water.

“We participated in the Science EXPO in April, and the Stockholm Junior Water Prize is in August. In between, we were privileged to visit researchers at DTU Environment who guided us with regards to report structuring and developing our research poster. They also let us use some of their equipment to refine our experiments,” the boys explained when we caught up with them during a short break at the conference centre in Stockholm.

All four participated in a tightly packed special conference programme for Stockholm Junior Water Prize contestants, while only two (Kristian Katholm Nielsen and Sebastian Lykke Dalsgaard) were allowed to present the project to the international jury.

"It was a great experience to present the project to the jury – not at all like an exam. They seemed really interested in our project and asked us questions about how we had thought and developed our project."
Kristian Katholm Nielsen

Nonetheless, all four had a learning experience for life, enjoying access to both interesting people and new knowledge.

“It was amazing to meet and spend time with the rest of our competitors. We all work on different projects, but in the end our interests are similar, as we all want to contribute to a water safe future,” concludes Rasmus Thoft Nygaard.

Meet the 2019 Stockholm Junior Water Prize participants:

Stockholm Junior Water Prize finalists 2019 from SIWI on Vimeo.

 

Stockholm Junior Water Prize
Stockholm Junior Water Prize gathers imaginative young minds from all over the world, encouraging their continued interest in water and sustainability issues. The competition draws thousands of entries from 38 countries.