Lane Tech High School senior Divine Osuji steals spotlight at Chicago Public Schools science fair
For decades, some of the city's brightest students have shown their very best at the Chicago Public Schools science fair, but a Lane Tech senior stole the spotlight this year.
Divine Favour Osuji, who just goes by Divine, doesn't just love science, he lives it, and he also lives to help people in need.
The young people participating at the 75th annual Chicago Public Schools Science Fair and Exhibition at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry are exploring just about anything you can think of, from clean eating to sensor fusion, and more.
But Divine's project is personal.
"Growing up, I saw my grandparents suffer with a lot of different health complications," he said. "We were spending all this money on these health care devices, yet it was also putting a horrible economic dent in our pockets. I just wanted to ensure other families out there don't need to go through that same emotional suffering."
So Divine decided to find a way people could monitor their health without breaking the bank.
"My focus was on measuring three primary health vitals; which were heart rate, temperature, and blood oxygen levels," he explained. "The whole point was to try to get accurate health measuring with vitals, also keeping the cost as small as possible."
This wasn't Divine's first rodeo. For other science fairs, he's created a prosthetic hand connected to a webcam.
"It's sort of like shadowboxing, in a sense, where whatever movement you made in front of that camera, the prosthetic would mimic that movement," he said.
He also developed a cost-effective way to remove garbage from a populated area back in his native Nigeria. All of his projects center on his basic belief that "anyone should be able to get adequate health care services, and there shouldn't be a price tag on that."
Lane Tech chemistry teacher Lucy Young heads the Alpha-STEM and science departments, and says his determination is amazing.
"Divine is one of those special kids," he said. "Divine has very creative energy to him. He sees a problem in the world, and he wants to try to fix it."
Divine said his parents are "driving factors" for him, and his grandfather urged him to think big, even as a little boy.
"We'd have a lot of intellectual debates, even though I was only 5 years old," he said.
Intellectual curiosity is what brought Divine and other budding scientists together at the fair. It means the world to Carrie Kaestner, a teacher at Von Steuben Metro Science Center, who helps put it all together.
"Their thoughtfulness, their professionalism, it just gives me hope for the future" she said. "These are our future voters, and they're going out, and they're going to be creating all this stuff and making the world a better place."
That's definitely Divine's plan. CBS News Chicago asked what he thinks his "super power" is.
"The ability, I guess, to acknowledge when I'm wrong because then it also gives me time to improve," he said. "I'm not incredibly arrogant. I still have a lot to learn."
Divine plans to major in biomedical engineering in college. Next year he'll be a science fair alum, following in the footsteps of others who went on to become engineers, doctors an teachers, many of whom CPS says return to the science fair as judges.
Earlier this year, Divine was named 2025 national STEM champion for developing that cost-effective prosthetic hand.
Do you know someone a person or place that brings you joy? We want to share your story.
Send us your "Eye on Chicago" ideas using the form below (or clicking here):
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Times
42 minutes ago
- New York Times
Live Updates: In Chaotic Economy, Hiring Remained Steady in May
Matt Minich, who was fired from his job with the Food and Drug Administration in February, was one of thousands swept up in the mass layoffs of probationary workers at the beginning of President Trump's second administration. After Matt Minich was fired from his job with the Food and Drug Administration in February, he did what many scientists have done for years after leaving public service. He looked for a position with a university. Mr. Minich, 38, was one of thousands swept up in the mass layoffs of probationary workers at the beginning of President Trump's second administration. The shock of those early moves heralded more upheaval to come as the Department of Government Efficiency, led by the tech billionaire Elon Musk, raced through agency after agency, slashing staff, freezing spending and ripping up government contracts. In March, about 45 minutes after Mr. Minich accepted a job as a scientist in the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health, the program lost its federal grant funding. Mr. Minich, who had worked on reducing the negative health impacts of tobacco use, observed that he had the special honor of 'being DOGE-ed twice.' 'I'm doubly not needed by the federal government,' he said in an interview. He is still hunting for work. And like hundreds of thousands of other former civil servants forced into an increasingly crowded job market, he is finding that drastic cuts to grants and contracts in academia, consulting and direct services mean even fewer opportunities are available. Some states that were hiring, another avenue for former federal government employees, have pulled back. So, too, have the private contractors typically seen as a landing place. The situation is expected to worsen as more layoffs are announced, voluntary departures mount and workers who were placed on administrative leave see the clock run out. Image More than 700 people attended a recent resource fair in Arlington, Va., to receive free consultation, professional headshots and workshops. Credit... Maansi Srivastava for The New York Times With Mr. Musk's time in Washington now done, a fuller picture of just how completely he and Mr. Trump have upended the role of government is coming into view. Federal tax dollars underpin entire professions, directly and indirectly, and the cuts led by Mr. Musk's operation have left some workers with nowhere to go. In Washington, D.C., and the surrounding area, the disruption has the hallmarks of the collapse of an industrial cluster, not unlike the disappearance of manufacturing jobs in the upper Midwest during the 2000s. Except this time, it is moving at lightning speed. In January, just as Mr. Trump was taking office, the civilian federal work force across the country had reached a post-World War II peak of 2.3 million, not including the Postal Service. Few agencies have publicly stated how many people have been fired or voluntarily resigned, but a rough count shows that federal agencies have lost some 135,000 to firings and voluntary resignation, with another 150,000 in planned reductions. Contracted and grant-funded workers — which the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta estimated to be as many as 4.6 million people — are harder to track in official data. The first contractor layoffs began in February with organizations that received funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development, like Chemonics and FHI360. As more grants and contracts that were under review across government are terminated, job cuts have gained steam. Booz Allen Hamilton, the sprawling consulting firm based in Northern Virginia that gets 98 percent of its revenue from the federal government, announced that it was cutting 7 percent of its 36,000-person staff. Even providers of Head Start, the low-income preschool program, have issued layoff notices because funding has been in doubt. While the national labor market remains stable, job loss is starting to become notable in the capital region. Unemployment rates in the District of Columbia and most of its surrounding counties have been on the rise since December. The number of people receiving unemployment insurance has been elevated in Virginia and D.C. over the past several months. Job postings in Washington have dropped across the board, according to the hiring platform Indeed, including in opportunities for administrative assistance, human resources and accounting. Local government agencies around Washington are hosting dozens of hiring events, and most of them are packed. Elaine Chalmers of Woodbridge, Va., was among 750 people who attended a recent resource fair in Arlington, Va., just outside Washington. The event offered free consultation for updating résumés, as well as professional headshots and workshops, including one on managing personal finances during a transition in employment. Image Elaine Chalmers of Woodbridge, Va., resigned from her role at the Agriculture Department to escape the stress and uncertainty created by new mandates. Credit... Maansi Srivastava for The New York Times It was the fourth one she attended in the month since she left the Agriculture Department, where she had worked for 20 years, most recently in the division that ensured equal access to grants for rural communities. She resigned to escape the stress and uncertainty created by new mandates, such as erasing words like 'equity' and 'diversity' from department communications. 'It just became almost a character question for myself,' said Ms. Chalmers, 53. 'I couldn't honorably stay.' Like many of the federal workers who chose to take a deferred resignation or early retirement, one of the tools the administration has used to shrink the work force, she is on leave and will be paid through September. It is a relief, she said, because she is the sole caregiver for her mother and 15-year-old son. But the prospects do not look good. Ms. Chalmers said she expected to have to take a pay cut. She said she applied for more than 100 jobs in the week before the job fair and received several automated emails informing her that she did not get the position. For many government workers, career transitions can be especially daunting because their jobs are often extremely specific, performing functions that do not exist in the private sector. 'For a lot of them, it's almost like starting from scratch,' said Laura Moreno-Davis, a spokeswoman for WorkSource Montgomery, the work force agency for Montgomery County, Md., just outside D.C. 'If they really have a wealth of experience and knowledge, how can we best use that?' A new group formed by two former federal employees is trying to help people do that. 'How do you translate these skills that you've learned in the federal government that are so complex and seem to be so unique into something that can be communicated easily outside of the federal government?' said Julie Cerqueira, co-founder of the group, FedsForward. Ms. Cerqueira's partner, Karen Lee, said that people who worked in federal disaster recovery and resilience jobs, for example, had expertise that could easily transfer to private-sector work in contingency planning and supply chains. But it is not so simple for everyone. Chelsea Van Thof, 33, is a public health veterinarian who focused on diseases that spread from animals to humans, and humans to animals — a niche job even in government. A few weeks after the inauguration, the contract she worked under at the State Department was placed on hold for a 90-day review and ultimately terminated. Dr. Van Thof immediately lost her health insurance and took on a housemate to cover her rent. Image Chelsea Van Thof, a public health veterinarian, saw the contract she worked under at the State Department be placed on hold for a 90-day review and ultimately terminated a few weeks after President Trump's inauguration. Credit... Maansi Srivastava for The New York Times Plans for the future changed, too, as she had been counting on public-sector loan forgiveness to pay off her $250,000 in veterinary school debt, a prospect that now seems increasingly remote. She sometimes feels as though she is sending résumés into a void. 'I was just thankful when I got a rejection because it meant they saw my application,' she said. Like others in the science field, including Mr. Minich, she is looking for jobs outside the country. And in the meantime, she helped form a support group of about 80 wildlife protection conservationists who are in similar predicaments. People working on government contracts are hit especially hard because they are not eligible for the deferred resignation plans available to federal employees, and cannot look forward to their pensions. Todd Frank, of Westminster, Md., was given just a few minutes' notice before he was laid off as a technical writer on a contract with the Department of Homeland Security's science and technology directorate, helping get the appropriate gear out to military personnel in the field. Mr. Frank, 54, is now wrestling with whether to uproot his family to find a new job, which would come with steep trade-offs. His wife runs her own business — a licensed day care out of their home. His teenage sons do not want to leave their high school, he said. Lately, he is looking at the family's budget for where to make cuts. 'Not being able to buy a suit for prom sounds like rich people problems, but you don't want to turn around and tell your kid, 'You can't do this' or 'You can't do that,'' Mr. Frank said. Several states had advertised their eagerness to hire people laid off by the federal government in the early days of federal cuts. In March, Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania said the state would give hiring preference to former federal workers. Since then, the state government has received more than 7,300 applications from people who said they had federal experience, his office said, and so far, state agencies have hired 120 of them. But state jobs have gotten a lot more popular in recent months. Since March, former and current federal employees have sent in nearly 700 applications, California's human resources office said. Some states are having their own budget problems, in part brought on by uncertainty around the continuation of federal funding. Alaska, Massachusetts, Indiana, Louisiana and New Hampshire have implemented hiring freezes. Public health agencies in Ohio and Alaska have laid people off as grants were canceled. And a broad swath of universities have also paused new hires, including the University of California system, the University of Pennsylvania, and Emory University in Georgia. With the Trump administration's firings of scientists and grant cancellations from agencies including the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, science and consulting have been hit especially hard, according to Indeed. Companies and nonprofits that helped evaluate whether federal programs were working, like American Institutes for Research, have let go up to a quarter of their payroll. Paro Sen, a research scientist in Cincinnati, was laid off in May along with most of the people in her office at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. She worked on industrial hygiene, studying worker exposures that cause chronic health problems, and visited Washington in May with her union to talk to members of Congress about the need to restore these jobs to the federal government. 'This was my dream job that I have been ripped from,' she said in an interview. Ms. Sen and her colleagues work in such a specialized field that they are competing for very few available jobs, especially if they want to stay where they are. 'The job market right now is not amazing,' said Ms. Sen, 29. 'Cincinnati is not a very big city, and you've got, suddenly, some of the smartest people in this field all applying and competing for the exact same jobs at the same time.'
Washington Post
an hour ago
- Washington Post
Poop at work. It's good for you!
Well+Being Poop at work. It's good for you! June 6, 2025 | 2:52 PM GMT Gastroenterologist Dr. Trisha Pasricha has some tips for whether to poop on company time (yes), whether to wait (no) and how to relax while on the job.
Medscape
an hour ago
- Medscape
Experimental MS Drug Nearly Eliminates Disease Activity
PHOENIX — Frexalimab, a second-generation anti-CD40 ligand monoclonal antibody provides extended tight control of multiple sclerosis (MS) whether measured by relapse or brain imaging at 2-year follow-up, results of an open-label extension (OLE) of a phase 2 trial showed. 'At week 96, there was almost complete suppression of new gadolinium-enhancing lesions with very similar pattern seen with new or enhancing T2 lesions,' said study investigator Stephen Krieger, MD, professor of neurology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City. Two phase 3 international studies with this drug are already enrolling. 'Part of the interest in frexalimab and anti-CD40 therapies is the idea that one can modulate both B- and T-cell activity without cell depletion,' explained Krieger, who presented the long-term open-label data on May 29 at the Consortium of Multiple Sclerosis Centers (CMSC) 2025 Annual Meeting. Near Complete Disease Suppression The latest data suggest frexalimab is fulfilling its promise. Over follow-up to date, there has been nearly complete suppression of gadolinium-enhancing (Gd+) lesions on MRI among those taking the dose now being tested in the phase 3 trials. At 2 years, with an annualized relapse rate of 0.08%, 92% of patients were relapse-free. The randomized portion of this phase 2 trial attracted attention when it was published a year ago in The New England Journal of Medicine , but the 2-year results showed that the efficacy and safety observed at 12 weeks persist. In the controlled trial, 129 patients with relapsing MS were randomized to 300-mg, 400-mg, 600-mg, or 1200-mg frexalimab or matching placebos. Suppression of Gd+ lesions was the primary endpoint. At 12 weeks, the adjusted mean of new Gd+ lesions was 1.4 in the combined placebo groups but 0.3 in the 300-mg frexalimab group and 0.2 in the 1200-mg group. Of those who participated in the randomized portion of the phase 2 trial, 97% continued into the long-term OLE. The OLE consisted of two arms: 1200-mg frexalimab administered intravenously every 4 weeks or 300-mg frexalimab administered subcutaneously every 2 weeks. At the end of 2 years, when 82% of those enrolled in the OLE were still on medication, the adjusted mean for new T1-weighted Gd+ lesions ranged from 0.1 to 0.3 across study arms whether on continuous frexalimab or switched from placebo to frexalimab. For those who were initiated on the 1200-mg dose in the controlled portion of the trial and remained on this dose for the OLE, the mean was 0.1. For the secondary endpoint of new or enlarging T2 lesions, the suppression at 2 years was almost the same. Again, the adjusted mean for new lesions across all arms ranged from 0.1 to 0.3. For those receiving the 1200-mg dose, the mean was 0.2. Mean T2 lesion volume increased in the placebo arm but not in the treatment arms during the randomized phase. After entering the OLE, T2 lesion volume fell in placebo patients now on active therapy. In the 1200-mg arm, the fall in lesion volume during the randomized phase continued into the first 24 weeks of the OLE. After 24 weeks, the lesion volume remained suppressed with no return toward baseline. Those initiated on placebo never caught up after switching to frexalimab. Relapse Rare — 2% at 96 Weeks On the 1200-mg dose of frexalimab, only 8% had any relapse recorded over the extended follow-up. In half, there was a single relapse. Only 2% had three or more relapses. While the Expanded Disability Status Scale score declined slightly among placebo patients once started on active therapy, there was no change from baseline through 96 weeks in patients started on any active therapy. As postulated by earlier preclinical and clinical studies, frexalimab had no effect on lymphocyte counts over time. Over the 96-week follow-up, levels of immunoglobulins remained unchanged, according to Krieger who showed graphs with straight lines for these values over the course of the OLE. Due to the potential of suppressing activation of both T and B cells over time, anti-CD40 therapies have long been considered a promising mechanism for control of MS. However, clinical development of first-generation drugs was abandoned because of an association with thromboembolism. 'Frexalimab has been engineered to avoid these events through a change in the Fc receptors with reduces downstream inflammatory events,' said Krieger. The long-term data support this premise. Over 2 years, there was one pulmonary embolism, but this exception was observed in a patient with a viral illness and a genetic predisposition for an inflammatory response, according to Krieger. When surveying other adverse events, 'nothing jumps out' in the OLE relative to the randomized phase. One potential exception is a rise in liver function tests observed in two (4%) patients on the 1200-mg dose. Only one of these patients discontinued therapy, and the levels returned to normal over time in both. The effects of the anti-CD40 mechanism on both the adaptive and innate immune systems suggest frexalimab might offer efficacy for both progressive and relapsing MS. In the ongoing phase 3 program, one of the trials (FREXALT) is enrolling patients with relapsing MS. The other (FREVIVA) is enrolling patients with progressive disease. Fulfilling its Promise Commenting on the results, Amit Bar-Or, MD, Chief of the Multiple Sclerosis Division, the Department of Neurology, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, described frexalimab as 'a very interesting drug.' He agreed that the CD40 ligand is a promising target in MS but cautioned that these phase 2 data cannot answer the most interesting questions. This includes the more robust evidence of safety and efficacy from phase 3 trials, but it remains unclear whether the benefits extend beyond controlling relapsing disease. 'I think there is particular interest in whether it will also show extended benefit in progressive MS, and this will be a major focus of interest from the next set of studies,' Bar-Or said.
