MASC Science Fair and Fund Raiser

The Marine Aquarium Society of Colorado prides itself on introducing new ideas, or reinventing ideas to try and better our club and our hobby at large. We pride ourselves on better educating our members to help properly care for the animals that we house. We typically do this through home meetings, meetings at local fish stores, and by bringing in experts to give seminars to our club members.

One great example of how we keep science in the forefront is our annual MASC Science Fair Competition. In the beginning the board of directors of MASC just wanted to do something fun and different. We came up with the idea of doing some sort of competition, and ended up with a great idea for a science fair! Not only this, but we also took it a few steps further to ensure we had special guest judges, as well as to ensure that the winner of our science fair would also win an all inclusive trip to MACNA with a $500 cash prize!! Our awesome panel of guest judges include; Marc Levenson of Reef Addicts, Christine Williams the head of the Mariponics Marine Research Laboratory at BASF, Richard Ross an aquatic biologist at the Steinhart Aquarium, Matt Pedersen of the Lightning Maroon Project and the Bangaii Rescue Project, and last but certainly not least Bob Fenner renowned speaker and contributor to Wet Web Media.

This is the second year in a row that the board of directors of MASC has worked tirelessly as we believe that as a club and a community as a whole we MUST get a younger group of people not only interested in our hobby, but also interested in the science behind our hobby! It is because of this that we have continued this tradition, and will continue into the foreseeable future. All of the science fair projects will be up for view at the club’s August meeting on the 25^th at the headquarters of Aqua Medic of North America, in Loveland CO. Not only will the science projects be on display, but this meeting will also be a frag swap, as well as a garage sale!

Unfortunately with great progress, also sometimes comes great tragedy. During the planning process of our science fair, the club lost a great contributor and board member. Don Volak was unfortunately taken away from us by cancer and didn’t get to see his hard work come to fruition. Don was not only a great contributor to our club by helping out members whenever possible, but he also was a great father and family man. He unfortunately left behind a great family including a newborn child. It is because of his continuous efforts to do his best to move our club forward as well as being a great all around person, that we are also dedicating our August 25^th meeting to Don Volak. The board of directors has also reached out to MANY different companies in hopes that they would donate raffle items to this meeting. A few generous members of our club have also donated the grand prize. The grand prize will consist of a 125 gallon tank, beautiful custom white stand/canopy, pumps, chemicals, sand, test kits, AC III & DC4HD, rock, and a bucket of Salinity. ALL of the money from these raffle items will be donated directly to the family of Don Volak. Please, if you are reading this and would like to donate something in honor of a great loss to our community, you can contact the MASC board of directors at board@marinecolorado.org. We would appreciate any and all donations.

In the end it’s all hobbyists job to ensure that we find creative and innovative ways to sustain not only our communities and clubs, but to make sure that our reefs and oceans continue to thrive. It’s through these different ideas that we ensure that our hobby will have continued success and will keep growing for future generations. If you would like more information on the Marine Aquarium Society of Colorado, please visit our website at www.marinecolorado.org


In memory of Don Volak 1978 - 2012