Olsen Lab

Three students and I took over the OMSI Physics lab for an evening to showcase all sorts of neat physics to 250 Portland-area teens.

Co-organized a press release viewing party. I mostly helped with the awesome nerdy cupcakes.

I gave a lecture about how we can use lasers to measure the amount of stuff is in the water and air around us.

Video conversations over the internet with classes of middle-school students about experimental physics in a laser cooling lab, through skype a scientist.

As part of a Canada-wide festival celebrating STEM, the Physics Department at the University of Toronto hosted an open house in Mclennan Physical Laboratory. In addition to assisting visitors with interactive demos, I led a tour of the Ultracold Atoms Group lab facilities. Over 50 guests ranging in age from about 8 to about 80 got to see how we use lasers and magnets to create some of the coldest matter in the known universe, and how we use that matter to understand the basics of superconductivity and magnetism.

At an all-day STEM event for students in 6th-8th grades, teams of 4 compete in a STEM trivia contest and a hands-on design challenge. Students also learn about science at several interactive demonstration booths. I supervised two teams and helped judge the design challenge.

In the 8th grade science classes of Susan Kalmbach and Bill Merritt at John Witherspoon Middle School in Princeton, NJ, I gave an interactive lesson with demonstrations on waves, sound, light, spectroscopy and the development of quantum theory.

I served as a judge for physics projects from students in 8th-12th grades, hosted at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ.