Who killed Meredith? Was it the owner of the logging company that she was trying to stop? Was it Cora, who was infatuated with Meredith's lover? Or, was it a fellow scientist competing for research grants?
Local Girl Scouts helped solve a mock-murder investigation Saturday while learning about careers in science and math.
Girl Scouts from around Morgantown tried to solve the mystery Saturday at the Murder Mystery Lunch organized by the West Virginia University Society of Women Engineers.
"SWE does this event every year," said Brittany Goff, a junior industrial engineering major and member of the WVU chapter of SWE. "We try to promote math, science and engineering to girls. We want to expose them to the fields because, a lot of times, it is geared toward boys, instead."
In the process of looking for clues for the investigation, the Girl Scouts earned an "eco-action" badge by completing activities at different stations during the event.
The Girl Scouts tried to solve the murder mystery by talking to each other and sharing their clues.
"The murder mystery is like a game of Clue to make it fun," Goff said. "So it's not just that they are coming on a Saturday to learn."
While learning and having fun were both goals, the overall purpose of the event remained to let the girls know about their opportunities.
"It is a way for them to earn a badge, and it is a way for us to give back to the community," Goff said. "We can show them, ‘Hey, girls can do math and science, too.'"
This year's theme was the Amazon Rainforest, Goff said.
"(For the badge) they need to learn about career exploration, water testing, noise pollution, environmental awareness and other cultures."
At one station, Jennifer Weidhaas, a civil and environmental engineering professor, taught the girls about careers in the environmental field.
To make it fun, Weidhaas had them build a "landfill in a cup" by layering different types of candy, sugar and ice cream, she said.
"The activity is very visual for them," she said.
Another station included a demonstration of a water filter, created by the WVU Engineers Without Borders.
"We have been helping with this event the last couple of years, and this year the theme really fits what we do," said Rob Murphy, a graduate mechanical engineering student who was on the team that went to Nicaragua to test the water filters.
"We are teaching them about sustainable design," said Spencer Teufel, a senior civil engineering major.
Teufel and Murphy taught the Girl Scouts about turbidity, which is how cloudy water is due to the number of dirt particles it contains. They then demonstrated how their filter works by sifting the water through a layer of biological matter and a series of different types of sand and gravel.
At other stations, the girls made posters about environmental awareness issues, talked about noise pollution and learned about native Amazonian people and how they interact with their environment.
is a member of the 
Be the first to comment on this article!