UNIVERSITY PARK — A team of Penn State graduate students recently placed first in the Northeast Weed Science Society’s annual “Weed Contest,” co-hosted this year by Rutgers University and Syngenta at the New Jersey Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Bridgeton, N.J.

The event this year tested participants’ weed science skills with hands-on sprayer-calibration problems, weed identification and herbicide mode-of-action identification tests. Students also were tasked with attempting to resolve a farmer’s weed-management problem in the field with role-playing volunteers.

Preparation for this contest is intended to be great experience for students who are interested in careers in agronomy and other agricultural service positions. North Carolina State University and Virginia Tech placed second and third, respectively, in the graduate student team competition.

In addition to the Penn State team of Laurel Wellman, Noelle Connors and Grant Hoffer winning the overall team award, team members garnered separate honors. Wellman won the overall individual award with the highest cumulative score across events, and Connors took home second place overall individual. Wellman also won first place in “Weed Identification.”  Finally, Akeshdeep Singh and Connors registered high scores for specific “farmer” problems that were included in the contest.

Members of the winning Penn State team were all students in the Agricultural and Environmental Plant Science master’s degree graduate program.