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Senior Alice Pang and juniors Alexandra Hanin and Judy Baek will participate in the USA Biology Olympiad (USABO) National Finals from Monday, June 2 to Saturday, June 14 at George Mason University in West Virginia. Stuyvesant is the only school in America with more than two finalists.

The USABO began in February with an open exam given to interested high school students nationwide. The top 10 percent or the top 500 Open Exam participants—including 13 Stuyvesant students—advanced to the semifinals.

Biology teacher Rosyln Bierig prepared students for the Olympiad by delivering lectures after school and distributing material.

“[Bierig] is not only an excellent coach,” Assistant Principal Biology Elizabeth Fong said. “She knows how to motivate the students to work effectively.”

“[Bierig] told us what topics to focus on, such as plants and biotechnology,” Hanin said. “She and Dr. [Jonathan] Gastel once spent half an hour arguing over how to solve a problem about DNA technology, which was pretty amusing to watch.”

The semifinal exam, which consisted of multiple choice, true or false questions and a short answer section, was administered in mid-March. “The test was insanely long. We started after school and I left Pang, Hanin and Baek are three of the 20 people who advanced to the USABO National Finals.

“I’m really honored to be a finalist,” Baek said. “A lot of my friends and classmates, who are amazing in biology, [took] the test. I really wasn’t sure if I could make it in.”

“We’re very proud of them,” Fong said. “We know how many hours of work they put in.”

“It’s an absolute joy for me to work with them,” Bierig said. “To get such results is very exciting.”

During the National Finals, which Fong describes as “Biology Olympiad Boot camp,” Pang, Hanin and Baek will work with leading biologists and participate in two weeks of intensive theoretical and practical tutorials.

At the end of the two weeks, the 20 finalists will compete for one of the four places on the United States team by taking two exams.

The four members of the United States team will participate in the International Biology Olympiad the week of Saturday, July 13 in Mumbai, India.