Science college stacks week with interactive projects
After nearly cancelling a week for the College of Science, Michael Stewart, the college’s senator, and his council banded together to create a few events he believes students will have a hard time forgetting.
Now that the week is organized, Stewart said he wishes he had put more of the “meat and potatoes” of science into the week, such as admirable speakers, but is sure the events currently in place will attract larger crowds.
The week begins on Albert Einstein’s birthday, and he will be celebrated at a social in the TSC Skyroom on Monday at 5 p.m. In addition to physics professor Shane Larson talking about Einstein’s contributions to the world of science, USU scientists will share with students the science research they are developing. These scientists will speak and meet with students to show them how they can begin developing their own research, Stewart said.
Pies will also be given away Monday to students who are able to recite the most digits from the number pi. Village Inn and USU Catering will donate pies, and they will be served to students from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. in the Merrill-Cazier Library atrium.
“Tuesday we are doing an event called ‘Don’t Put This in the Microwave,” said Science Council President Joe Watson. “We are essentially letting any student put something in the microwave, aside from the obvious aerosol cans and batteries.”
Watson was recently elected to become the next College of Science senator, and he said the science council has been working more persistently with advertising this year, because previous Geek Weeks did not encourage as much student involvement.
This year the science council reached out to every elementary school in Cache Valley to tell them about Thursday’s event, where 20,000 bouncy balls will be dropped from a helicopter onto the Stadium parking lot. Once they drop, anyone who is attending will collect as many bouncy balls as possible. Those who collect the most will receive a prize, said Doug Ball, who is co-chairing the bouncy ball drop with Stewart.
Ball is also the event coordinator for SPS. He said dropping the bouncy balls will give an idea of what happens when solar wind rushes charged particles at a satellite.
“Mike was being a little ridiculous and said ‘I want to do something crazy this year like drop 10,000 bouncy balls of the business building,'” Watson said. “He went to the Society of Physics Students (SPS) and bouncy balls were in the budget, so pretty much safety was the main concern, as well as property damage.”
SPS will measure and record the movement of the bouncy balls when they are dropped from the helicopter because their motion will be similar to the way particles react in outer space, which is important when considering the satellites that are currently in orbit, Watson said.
“I feel like if you are in the College of HASS or the College of the Arts you aren’t as proud to be in the college as you are in your particular major,” Watson said. “I’m proud of the College of Science’s prestige. We aren’t as big of geeks as people make us out to be.”
Stewart said there will be a physics demonstration Wednesday at 7 p.m. in the Eccles Science Learning Center where USU “demo God” James Coburnwill show laws of physics connected to electricity and magnetism as well as sound.
“We want to try and break that stigma that you have to wear a lab coat and have an IQ of 210 to like science,” Stewart said. “Science isn’t all geeky and all nerdy. I mean, we are celebrating computer science by hosting a Halo tournament.”
The Halo tournament will be held in the TSC Hub on Tuesday at 4 p.m., and students who want to enter the tournament will pay $5. The winning team will walk away with $40 gift cards to Game Stop in the Cache Valley Mall. Anyone else interested in playing Halo, but not participating in the tournament, may do so. All events that are not tournaments or competitions will be free of charge to USU students.
– catherine.meidell@aggiemail.usu.edu