Almost 1,500 high schoolers from around southern Ontario will visit campus this week for the University of Guelph’s tenth annual Science Olympics.

For the first time this year, all seven colleges will take part in the campus outreach event, including a business pentathlon run by the College of Business and Economics.

The event will take place May 10, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., in numerous locations from central campus buildings to the Macdonald Stewart Sculpture Park to the Arboretum.

About 150 volunteers – staff, faculty and graduate students – will run activities intended to spark interest in science and business and to showcase U of G to prospective students, said organizer Bonnie Lasby, B.Sc. program counsellor.

She says many Science Olympics participants from the past decade have subsequently pursued science degrees at U of G.

“We’re not going to get R&D unless we have scientists to do it,” said Lasby, a U of G biochemistry grad and self-described “science nerd.”

Science Olympics activities this year will include “molecular art” run by the College of Arts and an orienteering contest by the College of Social and Applied Human Sciences.

The Ontario Agricultural College will offer insect and weed identification, and the Ontario Veterinary College will run an animal anatomy contest.

Competitions run by the College of Biological Science and the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences will include animal and math quizzes and chemistry and building activities.

A scavenger hunt will tie together business, science and U of G information.

Lasby has run the annual Science Olympics since 2009. That year, the event attracted 450 participants from about 20 schools.

This week’s “Olympians” will visit from 39 schools between Windsor and Toronto, including every Guelph-area high school.

Among its sponsors, Fisher Scientific and Wellington Laboratories Inc. have supported the event each year since 2009.