Whiz Kid

To call Greg Marsden smart is an understatement.

The senior at North Hollywood High School enjoys the highest grade-point average on campus--4.475--and attends the school’s highly gifted magnet program, which requires a minimum IQ of 145 for admission.

He has scored a perfect 5 on nearly all of the 10 Advanced Placement exams he has taken--from chemistry to Spanish literature--and he has scored an enviable 1530 out of 1600 on the SAT.

Now Greg, 17, has added another prize to his academic trophy chest: He has been named one of 40 finalists in the Westinghouse Science Talent Search, and is the only Los Angeles County student selected for the prestigious nationwide competition, which counts five Nobel laureates among its previous winners.

Greg, an only child whose mother is a real estate agent and whose father teaches welding at adult school, got the news of his Westinghouse selection Sunday, during the Super Bowl. He will fly to Washington, D.C., in March, along with the other finalists, all vying for college scholarships of up to $40,000.

The soft-spoken student is tickled that his class science project--detecting the effect of sewage in Santa Monica Bay with a homemade water probe--has earned top honors.

“My project was a duct-tape-and-jam-jar contraption,” he said of the water probe he designed.

The contraption might have been crude by some measures, but it produced some highly sophisticated science, the Westinghouse scholars concluded.

Greg’s 18-month research project examined the effects of treated sewage flowing from the Hyperion Water Treatment Plant in El Segundo into the bay.

He collected water samples at the plant’s three outfalls, which discharge 300 million gallons of treated sewage a day, as deep as 400 feet under the sea.

Traveling to the locations with his father on their small sailboat, Greg dropped 38 Mason jars into the Pacific Ocean on a nylon rope weighted with an 8-pound dumbbell. Then he carried the water samples back to the school lab, where he studied them under a microscope and began his analysis.

His samples showed that plankton populations declined dramatically near the sewage discharge sites, demonstrating the adverse effect on the underwater food chain.

What began as his junior year science project in September 1996 garnered top prizes at the Los Angeles County Fair and the state fair last spring. Greg conducted a subsequent analysis last fall, then submitted the package to the Westinghouse competition.

Greg’s findings are contained in a 20-page research paper that includes charts, equations, maps and complicated scientific explanations. His research project--and those of the other finalists--were chosen from more than 1,500 entries.

Still, he is taking the latest accolade in stride.

After all, he is busy studying for final exams (he is taking six Advanced Placement classes, including art history and English literature). He is practicing with the school’s Science Bowl team for an upcoming competition (he’s the captain). He is refinishing a wood stage that he and his father built in an open area at North Hollywood High for plays and other events. And he is awaiting word on his applications to several Ivy League campuses, though he has no specific career plans yet.

“I haven’t had time to think it through,” Greg said of the Westinghouse honor. “I’m just dabbling in all sorts of fields.”

Greg’s Westinghouse sponsor and AP biology teacher, Koh Ikeda, is thinking plenty about the award. He says it reflects Greg’s intellect and will to produce top-notch work.

“To do a project like this, you have to be driven,” Ikeda said. “I’d get e-mail from him at 2 in the morning asking questions about data analysis. When Greg sets his mind to a task, he sees it through to completion.”

Greg does not know his IQ. He has never asked about it and isn’t interested in knowing, calling it unimportant. Even his mother, Hiroko, isn’t sure of the exact number. But Greg’s academic abilities emerged early. He began taking piano lessons at 2 and he has attended highly gifted magnet programs in the San Fernando Valley since elementary school.

Hiroko Marsden says her son’s abilities seem quite natural.

“I think he is just ordinary from our standards,” said Marsden. “He’s very motivated. He really does have a drive.”

Greg said his life does not revolve around academics. He enjoys playing classical music on the piano--Chopin is his favorite--and he likes backpacking with his parents in the Sierra Nevada.

“There’s more to life than just taking AP classes,” said Greg, who plans to take nine more AP exams in May.

“Computer games are always nice. Very relaxing.”