Two Chicagoans Announced as Finalists in MSI’s Roommate Search

UPDATE 10/6/2010

Kate McGroarty of Chicago was revealed as the winner live at the Museum the morning of Wednesday, Oct. 6—with the help of a fun chemistry experiment. All five  finalists performed a seemingly identical experiment in front of the packed Museum Rotunda—but only McGroarty’s experiment, mixing hydrogen peroxide, dish soap and sodium iodide, elicited a giant chemical reaction (and a lot of foam), revealing her as the Month at the Museum winner.

Two Chicago residents — a Flash developer/blogger and an aspiring comedy writer — are in the running to spend a month inside the Museum of Science and Industry.

After weeding through more than 1,500 applications, MSI leaders announced five finalists this week for their Month at the Museum contest.

Now, the decision rests with the voters. The public can vote online at monthaththemuseum.org from now until 5 p.m. on Oct. 4. The website contains applicant’s entry video, bios and an excerpt from his or her entry essay. The public’s vote will be taken into consideration by the MSI panel of judges, and the winner will be announced live at the museum on Wednesday, Oct. 6.

“We were blown away by the overwhelming worldwide response to this contest,” said Rob Gallas, the museum’s vice president and chief marketing officer. “The entrants were so creative—and so enthusiastic about science and this Museum—we decided we had to go out to the public with five finalists, two more than we originally planned.”

The finalists include a musician, a Flash developer, biology major, a window display artist and a theatre artist. All five candidates have agreed to give up an entire month of their lives to eat and sleep science at the largest science museum in the Western Hemisphere.

The finalists are:

• Alexandra Dainis, a biology major from Mansfield, Mass., who plans to prove that you can be both a rock star and researcher.
• Felix Jung, a Flash developer from Chicago, Ill., who is recently married and enjoys documenting the world around him on his blog.
• Krispijn Larrison, a window display artist from Seattle, Wash., who has dreams to be a children’s book illustrator.
• Kate McGroarty, most recently a high school theater teacher from Chicago, Ill., who aspires to write television comedies.
• Johnathan Wilson, a musician from Lake Charles, La., who plans to get a degree in biology and later work to eradicate land mines.

The winner will keep a blog during their month at the museum and will take home $10,000.