The 33rd annual Southeast Michigan Junior Science and Humanities Symposium (JSHS) will take place Thursday and Friday, March 6 and 7, in the McGregor Memorial Conference Center at Wayne State University.

More than 150 area high school students and teachers will participate. Twenty students will present their research projects. The winner will receive a $4,000 scholarship and a WSU Presidential Scholarship, and will be the regional JSHS representative to the May national symposium in Raleigh, N.C.

Hosts for the national symposium will be the University of North Carolina, Duke University and North Carolina State University. Forty-seven regional victors compete in the national JSHS. National finalists receive a $16,000 scholarship and a two-week trip to London, England, for international competition.

Among speakers for the JSHS here will be Sylvester Gates, University of Maryland physics professor; Gloria Heppner, associate chairwoman of internal medicine and researcher with the Karmanos Cancer Institute; and physics Professor Paul Keyes.

Music Professor Robert Townsend will direct an ensemble depicting African-American history through music. Campus tours will be conducted by Center for Molecular and Cellular Toxicology faculty and students directed by Mary Dereski.

Winners of the Michigan JSHS competition also won at the national JSHS in 1989, 1990, 1991,1995 and 1996, and took second place in 1993.

Says Rudi Alec, associate professor of education who coordinates the JSHS symposium, "Our symposium is highly visible at the national level not only because of the large number of first place winners; we are the only symposium that has three representatives involved at the national level.

"From our area," he says, "Herbert Dobbs was appointed to a three-year term on the national advisory board of the Academy of Applied Science. Brian Derowski, a teacher and WSU alumnus, was appointed to serve a three-year term on the Regional
Director's Executive Council. Brian is one of two teachers representing the teachers of all 47 symposia."

And Alec is himself on the Regional Director's Executive Council and was elected chairman unanimously for three consecutive terms. He also conducts the meeting of the 47 directors at the national and represents the 47 directors on the national advisory board.

The Army, Navy and Air Force recently joined in JSHS sponsorship with the Academy of Applied Science, Association of the U.S. Army and the U. S. Tank Automotive Command in Warren.

For more information call Alec at the college of education, (313) 577-0960.