The inspiration for tomorrow’s scientists and engineers might be lurking in plain sight at home, or it might come from a simple remark that piqued the interest of a curious mind. 

It’s all fair game for the young creators of the hundreds of projects at the annual Milwaukee Public Schools STEAM Fair, which this year drew more than 750 students from 50-plus schools. 

Reel Osman, who is in the 7th grade at IDEAL School, heard a teacher warn against using AI for research projects because it can be unreliable. Reel observed that artificial intelligence will supply incorrect answers but do it with great confidence.  

The result: her project, “AI: Confidence vs. Accuracy,” which won 1st place in the grades 6 to 8 science division at the fair, held May 21. 

Testing Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini 

Reel wanted to test AI’s accuracy and its confidence in its answers, so she tested three models—Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini—across five areas: history, English language arts, math, science, and logic.  

She asked each model the same series of 250 questions across the five subjects, and asked each model to score how confident it was in each answer, on a scale of 0 to 100.  

The result: ChatGPT, the most used model, had the largest overconfidence gap—that is, very confident in its answers even when the answers were incorrect. Claude had the smallest overconfidence gap and also had the highest accuracy rate. 

Reel correctly hypothesized that ChatGPT would have the most errors (because it is the most used). Reel also hypothesized that the subjects with the most errors would be logic and math because of the wording and difficulty, but the most error-prone subject for AI turned out to be history. “I think this is because of historical debate,” she said.  

The STEAM Fair was a great experience for Reel, who participated last year in the engineering division. (Her brother, Abubakr, a freshman at Reagan College Preparatory High School, also won first place this year, in the high school engineering division. For his project, “Talking Hands,” he programmed a robotic hand and arm to sign the alphabet.) 

“I wanted to raise more awareness” about AI and have her project serve as a precaution, particularly as various cheating scandals involving AI surface, Reel said. 

She’s hoping to participate in the STEAM Fair again next year. Ultimately, her dream is to become a radiologist, but she said, “I’m really drawn to math” and is open to other career opportunities — ”something that can really test my brain.” 

A Mechanism for Cats and Doors 

Olof Knox, a 7th-grader at Golda Meir School’s upper campus, noticed his two cats “trying to wiggle open doorknobs but just failing,” he said. He wondered if he could develop a mechanism that would allow them to open doors that have trickier-to-operate knobs (instead of the easier levers).  

Olof made multiple prototypes, and the first two worked, to an extent. “I learned that opening doorknobs is actually something that humans can uniquely do very well,” he said. “The human body itself is actually stronger than machines trying to do the same action.” 

Plants and Music 

Meanwhile, Lionel Cansino, who is in the 7th grade at H.W. Longfellow School, decided to investigate whether exposure to music affects plants’ growth. “My mom always liked listening to music while cleaning, and she loved plants. She always had a lot of plants. I was curious if it truly affected the plants’ growth, the type of music you play,” Lionel said. 

He exposed one plant to classical music and the other to rock music; he suspected the plant exposed to classical music would do better. By Day 5 of Lionel’s experiment, the classical music plant was already showing signs of sprouting, while the rock music plant was not. "By Day 30, you can see that I have a lot of flowers on the classical music plant, and the rock music plant didn’t have as many. My hypothesis was correct,” Lionel said. He added that his online research found other experiments showing that gentle music appeared to stimulate growth, while harsher sounds appeared to stress plants.  

In addition to conducting experiments and testing prototypes, students researched their topics and constructed their displays for the 19th annual MPS STEAM Fair, celebrating science, technology, engineering, art, and math.  

The fair this year was held in the fieldhouse at Harold S. Vincent School of Agricultural Sciences, 7501 N. Granville Road. While at Vincent, STEAM Fair participants toured the agricultural buildings and checked out kinetic art, glow art, rockets, and drones. 

This year, students completed more than 270 projects in science and engineering. (Many of the students worked in teams on projects.)

Roaming Judges 

Judges who roam the fair to examine the exhibits and quiz the students are checking to see how well students followed the processes — incorporating background research plus experimenting and testing to make their claim, come to their conclusion, or solve a problem.  

The judges also consider a project’s connection to the real world and whether the project furthers research on its topic. 

Ashley Hughes, an MPS Office of Finance employee who has been volunteering as a STEAM Fair judge for about 10 years, said of students, “I like the excitement they all have and the interest they have in their own projects when they’re talking about their projects.”  

Tomorrow’s SHEroes Winner 

One student was chosen for the Tomorrow's SHEroes in STEAM award: Az Zariyah Taylor of Westside Academy. The award is presented each year to a female student in grades 5 to 7. It honors former K-8 science instructional coach Lisa Martin and Ms. Martin’s work to build the STEAM Fair and other STEAM opportunities for female students in MPS. 

Az Zariyah received a plaque and a certificate to attend a camp of her choosing at Discovery World this summer.  

The 2026 MPS STEAM Fair was made possible by sponsors GE Healthcare, ATC, Generac, STEMscopes, and the MPS Foundation. 

Button Design Winners

Students also used their artistic talents for the annual STEAM Fair button design contest. The creators of the winning designs were: 

• K4–Grade 2: 
  • 1st place, Bb Zulaika Mohammad Ali, Longfellow School, grade 2 
  • 2nd place, Francesca Solano, Longfellow School, grade 2 
  • 3rd place, Yaresli Magana-Trejo, Longfellow School, grade 1 
• Grades 3–5: 
  • 1st place, Alisson Garciz Perez, Longfellow School, grade 4 
  • 2nd place, James Cortez, IDEAL School, grade 5 
  • 3rd place, Priscilla Perez, Longfellow School, grade 5 
• Grades 6–8: 
  • 1st place, Ana Roman Osorio, Longfellow School, grade 7 
  • 2nd place, Nor Alia Salim Ullah, Garland School, grade 8 
  • 3rd place, Jandel Montalvo, IDEAL School, grade 7 
• Grades 9–12: 
  • 1st place, Leilena Cuellar, Pulaski High School, grade 12 
  • 2nd place, Fermin Martinez, South Division High School, grade 9 
  • 3rd place, Kashindi Kichasa, South Division High School, grade 9 

2026 STEAM Fair Winners 

Congratulations to this year’s STEAM Fair winners: 

• K–Grade 2 Science:
  • 1st place, Carson Academy of Science, for the project “Straw Rocket,” by Kobe Wilder and Sa’Amiyah Welch 
  • 2nd place, Sherman Multicultural Arts School, “Growing Bacteria,” Alona Howard, Noel Vaughn, Enphiniti Lee, Dazyonhi Smith 
  • 3rd place, tie, Carson Academy, “Preserving Bananas,” Mylee Wilder, Malik Welch 
  • 3rd place, tie, Doerfler School, “Outstanding Orbeez,” Jayce Thornton 
• Grades 3–5 Science: 
  • 1st place, Carver Academy, “Collisions,” Aaminah Summerville, Caelyonna Newsome-James, Craig Elliot, Zoey Jordan 
  • 2nd place, Milwaukee German Immersion School, “Memory and Association,” Tegan Stadler, Astrid Schleicher, Beatrice Prendergast 
  • 3rd place, Longfellow School, “Walking Water,” Yaretzi Santos Sixteco 
• Grades 6–8 Science: 
  • 1st place, IDEAL School, “AI: Confidence vs. Accuracy,” Reel Osman 
  • 2nd place, Golda Meir School, “How Does Growing Plants in the Same Container Affect Their Growth Rate?” Sophie Burns 
  • 3rd place, Golda Meir School, “Bacteria in the Classroom,” Mila Sengyothinh 
• Grades 9–12 Science: 
  • 1st place, Reagan College Preparatory High School, “The Disappearing Act: How the Acidic Level of Liquids Affects Erosion,” Anika Akin 
  • 2nd place, South Division High School, “La Radiacion,” Valeria Salcedo, Oscar Delgado 
  • 3rd place, Reagan High School, “The Effect of Different Ingredients in Bubble Solution on Size of Bubble Created,” Victoria Quirk 
• K–Grade 2 Engineering: 
  • 1st place, Hartford University School, “Paper Airplane Project,” Daliylah Davis, Mariah Moore, Ric’Kai Hibbler, Amani Terry 
  • 2nd place, Academia de Lenguaje y Bellas Artes (ALBA), “Magnificent Maze,” Valeria Gonzalez, Ainhoa Cruz Gonzalez, Tadeo Quiroz, Sahid Valdivia-Rios 
  • 3rd place, ALBA, “aMAZEing Maze,” Aydelin Golpe, Izarellet Oceguera-Gonzalez, Santiago Lopez Vivanco, Abryanna Ocon 
• Grades 3–5 Engineering: 
  • 1st place, Longfellow School, “Mecanica Hidráulica,” Emmanuel Villegas 
  • 2nd place, Rogers Street Academy, “Cafecito Solar,” Ana Ortiz, Karen Carrasco, Victoria Orduz 
  • 3rd place, Gaenslen School, “Electric Lift,” William Smith III 
• Grades 6–8 Engineering: 
  • 1st place, Golda Meir School, “Is It Possible to Convert the Energy of Bikers into Electricity?” Elias Hoban 
  • 2nd place, Garland School, “Hydraulic Bridge,” Muhammad Ozail, Hayatullah Hashimi 
  • 3rd place, Carver Academy, “Water Filtration System,” Amyra Drayton, Antoine Drayton, Elijah Hill, LaVina Kennedy-Harper 
• Grades 9–12 Engineering: 
  • 1st place, Reagan High School, “Talking Hands,” Abubakr Osman 
  • (No 2nd or 3rd place winners chosen)