Polygence – Environmental & Earth Science Research
One-on-one research mentorship pairing high schoolers with a PhD mentor to design and complete an original environmental or earth science project, spanning topics like geology, natural hazards, and sustainability, culminating in a paper, presentation, or other deliverable.
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Earth Science Week Contests (AGI)
Annual national contests held during Earth Science Week (mid-October), sponsored by the American Geosciences Institute. Students enter the photography, video, visual arts, or essay contest with work tied to that year's Earth Science Week theme.
Weather Archive Africa (Zooniverse Citizen Science)
A virtual citizen-science project where volunteers help digitize and quality-check historical African weather station records from paper archives, supporting climate change research across 43 African countries. Students transcribe station names, dates, and readings, and flag damaged documents.
AGU Bright STaRS
American Geophysical Union program inviting middle and high schoolers worldwide to present original Earth and space science research, including earthquake and seismology topics, as a poster at AGU's Annual Meeting, with complimentary conference registration included.
EarthCache
A free, worldwide geology-focused offshoot of geocaching, developed with the Geological Society of America. Participants use GPS coordinates to visit geologically significant real-world sites, answer earth-science questions about what they observe, and can complete self-paced EarthCache Academy lessons on topics like geologic time, fossils, and earthquakes.
Irish Weather Rescue
Zooniverse citizen-science project run by Met Éireann (Ireland's national meteorological service) with the Adler Planetarium, University of Minnesota, and University of Oxford. Volunteers transcribe handwritten historical rainfall ledgers online to digitize over 3.5 million observations and help reconstruct Ireland's historical climate record.
Mountain Rain or Snow
NASA- and Desert Research Institute-backed citizen science project (started as Tahoe Rain or Snow) where volunteers text or use a web app during winter storms to report whether precipitation is rain, snow, or a mix, helping researchers improve mountain precipitation forecasting models used across the Sierra Nevada and other US mountain regions.