However, your project must rest upon work done by you. It is permissible to obtain assistance from others, but never to the extent that you are standing on the sidelines watching someone else do your work. Keep your interviews brief and approach each conference with a clear idea of what you are seeking and why, and always only after you have already done as much as possible—whether by way of reading or project work—to find the answer on your own. By doing this you will gain valuable habits of self-reliance, and added stature in your adviser’s eyes. _Special equipment and materials_ may be obtained or borrowed through laboratories. College laboratories assist sometimes. Some industrial organizations may have surplus equipment and materials that they are willing to lend or donate. Documenting Your Work Project Notebook Every scientist worth his salt keeps detailed notes on each project on which he works. You should do likewise. This notebook, which could as well be a set of file cards, contains a running, day-by-day account of everything that concerns the project—observations, speculations, experiments, materials, expenses, procedures, data and observations, hypotheses, checks for validity, conclusions, and conjectures. From such notebooks comes the information for the scientist’s formal report, or “paper”, by which he advises his employers and colleagues of the progress of his work. Since the notebook contains everything pertaining to your project, it may become disarranged, no matter how well you organize it in the beginning. If so, don’t worry—just keep it up to date. Project Report But there should be nothing haphazard about the final report on your project. In some science fairs, this report is displayed in the exhibit and considered in the judging. Even where not required, the project report belongs with your exhibit. After writing your report you will find that much of your exhibit planning—and even some of the text which will appear in your exhibit—is already accomplished. If you are doing your project as a classroom assignment, your teacher may specify the manner in which your report is to be organized. Otherwise, you can follow a format such as this: 1. TITLE. Keep it short. If accuracy requires more than a few words, consider using a very brief main title and a more definitive subtitle. 2. ABSTRACT. This is a very brief condensation of the entire report summarizing the objectives of the project, what you did, and the conclusions you came to. 3. INTRODUCTION. Describe your topic and give some background information such as relevant work done by others. Summarize your purpose, scope, and method of investigation. State the questions or hypotheses your examined. Include the most significant findings of your investigations. 4. MATERIALS AND METHODS. Describe in detail the materials, equipment, methods, experiments, controls, unforeseen difficulties and remedies.