 |
| 2011 Art of Science competition First Prize |
2011 may be winding down but it seems like things are as fun, as varied, and as busy as normal. The Sustainability Workshop high school is doing well and the Philadelphia Inquirer just ran a front-page article on the school and the school founder, Simon Hauger, recently gave a talk on the school at PopTech. The 2011 Art of Science competition was a huge success, we received press coverage around the world, including a slide show at the New York Times. The winning image. while not a photo of a plasma, is from a post-doc affiliated at PPPL and so that means that of the five competitions, PPPL people have won three. The physical gallery opened on 11/11/11 in the Friend Center on campus and I had the pleasure of lecturing to a group of K-12 superintendents, principals, and supervisors on the intersection of art and science and the use of images like this to communicate with the general public on scientific topics. The entire Science Education staff spent a week in Salt Lake City at the American Physical Society's Division of Plasma Physics meeting where 1,500 plasma physicists from around the world shared the latest results. We presented our own work on our partnership with NASA, our efforts to recruit young women into careers in science, and our study of the effectiveness of our programs. For example, since 2000, 72% of our undergraduate interns have gone on to a graduate school in a science, engineering, or technical field. Of those, 44% are studying plasma physics. And finally, I completed my machine shop course. One drill indicator, one plumb bob, and one fly cutter, priceless.
