The sixth annual Illinois Valley Regional "You Be the Chemist Challenge" was a fight to the finish for local contestants.

The contest was at Feb. 22 Seneca Elementary School. It began with the runners-up from 10 schools in Will, Grundy and La Salle counties competing in a preliminary contest to eliminate all but two who would compete with the 10 first-place school winners in the main contest.

Dan Niswonger (Seneca) and Brad Wyss (Mazon-Verona-Kinsman) won that opportunity and took over those open spots. More rounds of questions and lightning rounds to eliminate contestants during tie breakers went on for hours, but the top students persevered to the end.

The contest heated up even more when the panel tried to stump the last four contestants to establish winning ratings. Chandler Lourie from Oglesby-Washington Junior High emerged as the first-place winner, Aaron Kamke from Waltham Elementary was second place, Caroline Collet from Mazon-Verona-Kinsman was third, and Niswonger fourth.

The four top winners are now bound for the state contest. The top three automatically compete, and Niswonger will compete against other fourth-place students to vie for one open spot at state. Sixteen contestants will square off Wednesdaym, March 24, in Des Plaines for that contest, which is coordinated by the Chemical Industry Council of Illinois.

Regional Coordinator Pat Neff thinks this year's group from the Illinois Valley will give the Chicagoland sites a run for their money.

The winner at the state level advances to the national contest in Philadelphia Friday, June 18.

The winners receive prizes at each level, and Oglesby-Washington will received $500 for its science program because of Lourie's victory.

All regional contestants were given goodie bags of donated items from Aux Sable Liquids, AkzoNobel Surface Chemistry, Flint Hills Resources (Peru), Carus Corporation and Dow Chemical-Wilmington. Other sponsors of the contest were Exelon-Dresden Station, PQ Corporation and Air Products and Chemicals.

For more information, visit the Chemical Educational Foundation's Web site www.chemed.org. The site has free activities, lesson plans, games for teachers and details about past contests as well as about the upcoming national contest.