Eleven Shoreham-Wading River High School juniors and seniors, along with science teacher Ms. Lori Racaniello and English teacher Mr. Ed Storck, participated in the 5th annual Northwell Health Spark Challenge competition recently held at the Crest Hollow Country Club. The goal of the challenge is to engage and inspire healthcare leaders of the future.

Eilis Casey, Jackie Holden, Jenna Lesiewicz, Katlynn McGivney, Danielle Ohrtman, Julia Petreczky, Mahdi Rashidzada, Emma Reilly, Erin Reilly, Zana Sawas and Elle Schepis presented to a group of vice presidents of Northwell Health and other industry leaders. They also interacted with over 70 other groups from schools on Long Island to learn about their learning experiences in health care and tested a Da Vinci machine, which is a minimally invasive robot that surgeons use to perform operations with faster recovery times.

Earlier this year, these students who are in the school’s Advanced Placement Research and Women in Science and Engineering program, visited Northwell Health’s Islandia location where they learned about the economics of the healthcare industry, the importance of meaningful patient care and had the opportunity to interview a registered nurse who leads a team of nurses. They used this event to help create the presentation and informational materials to help educate others on what they learned through this experience as part of the competition.

“Healthcare is one of the fastest growing industries and this was a really amazing opportunity to share learning experiences with other students,” said junior Jackie Holden, who is in both the WISE program and Advanced Seminar class.