Introduction
Independent research is actually more common than you’d think — it’s how most prolific ISEF qualifiers start their journey! In general, having research experience on your resume is a great way to build skills across computing, engineering, writing, and more. Honestly, I was completely overwhelmed when I first started looking for a topic. Every website I checked either featured the classic exploding volcano or something so complex it exceeded any reasonable scope for a high schooler. There was never an in between! I’ll be referencing my own research throughout this article, so feel free to check out my abstract on my research page.
Finding a Topic
The hardest step is always finding a good topic — data collection is a piece of cake compared to it. I can already picture the frustrated faces: “But how do I actually find one?!” If you’re in high school, you’ll probably want something with a reasonable level of complexity, which I’ll get into. If you’re in middle school, I’d suggest starting with Science Buddies (https://www.sciencebuddies.org) — it’s a great place to branch off from.
I found my topic by browsing YouTube, particularly Veritasium’s channel (https://www.youtube.com/@veritasium), which is full of fascinating physics ideas. Another approach is to cold-email local professors and ask if they’d be willing to supervise a project or suggest ideas. That route doesn’t always pan out, so doing your own literature reviews and watching videos is usually more reliable.
The best strategy is to take a well-known problem and give it a unique twist that hasn’t been explored before. My project dealt with synchronizing pendulums — a topic studied by top institutions like Harvard and UCLA. After reviewing the existing research, I noticed that nobody had specifically looked at how the physical properties of the pendulum affected synchronization. So I did just that.
Reading it plainly, the topic might not sound groundbreaking — changing string lengths to observe how synchronization in coupled pendulums changes? But I was surprised to learn that synchronization is actually used in end-to-end encrypted systems as an encryption key. The lesson: find a topic you’re genuinely passionate about, then discover the applications later.
Now that a topic is secured, what’s next?
Collecting the Data
This is the most crucial part of the experiment. I needed to collect the synchronization times for each string length that I set the coupled pendulums to have. For my project I created physical pendulums but I also had a computer model of my coupled pendulums. This was to corroborate the data from my man made pendulums because they may not be super accurate. Luckily, to my favor, the data from both models matched without any changes from my part.
Creating the pendulums was quite hard and I had to recruit the help of my brother to help complete them. Let me just say, there were a lot of sticks and hammers all over my workspace (shown below).
The pendulums that I created are also shown below, though they show hex nuts on them instead of bobs. I found that the hex nuts carried a lot of air resistence and kept twisting in the air; I changed it to a bob later because of the hassle it caused.
Most data collection is quite menial. Whether you are running a computer program or simulations, it’s never fun. But it has to be accurate. Sometimes, my pendulums would be off center on the platform or the platform would roll off the cans so I would have to redo those cases. Most of my data collecting was me sitting in front of my apparatus with my lab notebook: of course, I had a pencil in one hand and my stop watch in the other.
The most important thing is to keep a neat lab notebook because it documents your whole research journey. I made an effort to include my analysis of data in there and not just my quantative numbers. Judges at science fairs also really appreciate a neat notebook.
Writing a Report
Most research papers make use of LaTeX, a typesetting language that’s excellent for papers with a lot of math. I have a LaTeX tutorial on my blog if you want to get started. Even if your project isn’t math-heavy, LaTeX makes your paper look clean and professional. You can also browse papers on arXiv to see how it’s used in practice. When analyzing your data, make sure you include solid statistical analysis. For me, that meant adding regression lines and error bars to my graphs.
One thing I kept slipping up on while writing: using “I” or “we” in the paper. Research papers should be written in passive voice throughout — a surprisingly hard habit to form when you’ve spent a year in AP Language and Composition.
Presenting at Science Fair
Presenting at a science fair is somehow ten times more nerve-wracking than any other presentation I’ve given. Maybe it’s the judges standing just a few feet away, or the clipboards and quiet, evaluating eyes. Whatever it is, it’s real.
I’ve seen genuinely impressive, ISEF-worthy projects get passed over because the presenter left the judges more confused than when they walked up. Science is fundamentally about communicating ideas clearly, and that’s exactly what judges are evaluating. Fancy vocabulary means nothing if no one understands you. In fact, clarity was one of the most consistently positive comments on my feedback rubric — and getting that rubric back is itself a great reason to participate in science fairs.
For my setup, I brought one of my physical pendulums and played a video of them synchronizing. It did a lot of the talking for me and helped me stay concise. My poster is pictured above — I used it for my school, county, and tri-state science fairs.
There’s no single right way to design a poster since the science matters far more than the aesthetics. A lot of people print their entire poster as one large sheet at Staples, and honestly it does look impressive. I kept it simple and printed individual slides from a Google Slides presentation. Both work fine.
Final Thoughts
The takeaway is this: you don’t need a PhD-level project to do well at a science fair or impress people with your research. As long as your data is solid and your presentation is clear, you’ll go far. And along the way, you’ll learn so much more than you ever would working on something you don’t actually care about.