Virtual Fair Presentation Guidelines

• All students must upload a presentation file. You will use this presentation file during the judging sessions.. This presentation file will be reviewed for compliance with our Display Rules, as always. In other words, this replaces the display review that normally takes place at the science fair. The maximum size of the file is 10 MB.
• The presentation should be either powerpoint or a multipage PDF. The upload program accepts PDF files as well as PPT and PPTX. Please note that a PowerPoint file submitted must NOT contain either notes or audio: just the slides. This rule is for consistency with the capabilities of a PDF file. You should design the slides in this file for presentation in 10 minutes or less. That means we recommend 10 slides or less. You should not spend more than 3 minutes on background information and methods. The bulk of your presentation should focus on the results and conclusions.
• If you think your project needs a demo video (and I note that most do not!), then you may upload a video, up to two minutes in length, using the link on your Entry Status screen. We expect very few of these. This video will be allowed for use during the judging presentation, if it is supplied and approved in advance.
• A recorded presentation is requested, but not mandatory. You can upload these videos via the link "Video Presentation" on your Entry Status Screen. DO NOT EMAIL THESE FILES TO US! These recordings, along with the submitted presentation files, will become part of a virtual fair, accessible to the public after the judging is complete and the awards are announced. Note that, for this presentation, it is your choice whether to share your image as a thumbnail on the recording of the presentation. Also, the presentation files (non-video) will be released for public viewing only if you give permission on the Supplemental Registration form. We plan to leave this virtual fair in place for the remainder of the year..

  These files are restricted to 25 MB in size If you record in HD with a high frame rate you will rapidly exceed that size. When displaying a presentation file with voice overlay, that is highly unnecessary. A frame rate of 25 frames/sec is plenty, and resolution as low as 1280x780 is usually sufficient. It is very easy to choose (unnecessarily) higher parameters than can inflate the file size as much as a factor x8 or more, and we want you to choose parameters that will fit within the 25 MB guideline. And, as a reminder, if you have submitted a demonstration video, then there is no need to include that in your presentation video, since it is separately linked to your abstract (if it has been submitted).

• The time allotted for each interview will be 15 minutes. You should plan your own presentation to be no more than 10 minutes, to allow adequate time for questions. The judging interviews will NOT be recorded, and we will require that you use a webcam.
• Awards and certificates will need to be mailed out afterward. We'll do the best we can, but the processing of these shipments may take a few weeks.

Presentation Deadlines

• Prepare AND UPLOAD your presentation. Submit your Abstract. The deadline for the initial submission of your presentation is March 1. The approval must be in place by March 7, but it will take time for these reviews. If revisions are requested, you will need to do so immediately. THE FINAL PRESENTATIONS MUST BE IN PLACE AND APPROVED BY MARCH 11. Once the file is approved, you will not be able to update it without requesting permission. You must have an abstract in place by March 1, but you are allowed to update it until the fair.

  Note: for projects excluded from the exhibition phase, students may (optionally) upload a presentation file by March 11. The abstract is required, though, and the deadline for initial uploads is March 11.

• Finally: remember that your abstract is going to be the first thing the judges see about your project. The abstract should summarize your main results. Ending your abstract with "Data is [sic] currently being collected and analyzed." is not a good idea in this context.

• No display of your age, grade, or school.
• No mention of previous awards, patents, etc.
• No mention of the name or institution of your mentor.
• A clear separation between the background material (including especially portions of the project done by your mentor or by others in the group, or your work in a prior year) and the work you are currently reporting.
  • The one departure from normal display rules is in the case where you want to compare data obtained previously or by others with your own, current data. On the actual poster, we have required that the comarative data be presented in the background section, isolated from your data. Since that doesn't quite work in a presentation, we have revised this rule to say that the two datasets may appear on the same slide, so long as they are plotted in separate graphs on the slide, and clearly labeled as to source.
• If you report results obtained by your mentor, just say "my mentor" -- do NOT use his/her name.
• If there are photos, graphs, or data displayed, you should state explicitly in text (not in footnotes) whether those items were obtained by you, by your mentor (or research group), or from other published work.
  • Clarification: This does not mean you should put in full citations on the slides (in unreadably small font). Just put something like "J. Smith, 2016" or "Univ of Okla website, news item," and put the full citation at the end in a list. That is short enough to use a normal font, but not so tiny as a footnote (which we explicitly do not want).
• No depiction of vertebrate animals under non-normal conditions.
• If you are required to display a Form 1C, then your title slide should contain one of the following statements:
  • If you worked at an outside lab, then the notation should be "this work was performed at a [university/industrial/private] lab." (choose the correct word).
  • If you worked at home or at school with a mentor who was not your teacher (note this includes your parent), then the notation should be "this work was performed with an outside mentor."