Info & Training Sessions for New Volunteers!

Our most frequently asked question is: 

What is the time commitment?

We ask our volunteers to commit at least 10 hours per year. Some volunteers will help with a few regular activities (1-2 hours each) throughout the year. Some volunteers may instead choose to help with one or two half- or all-day events, like our College Royal Display or the Let's Talk Science Challenge. Some volunteers will opt to help out more than the 10 hours per year (last year, our top 5 volunteers had each put in over 40 hours!), but this is above and beyond our expectations. :D

If you can offer us about 5 hours per semester, we'd be thrilled.

Link to register for a session: www.surveymonkey.com/s/GF78BDN

Happy National Volunteer Week!

It's National Volunteer Week, and I'd like to take a moment and recognize a few of our outstanding volunteers!!!

These volunteers are so stellar, we nominated each of them for a National Let's Talk Science award!

Kate Bishop Williams  (Nominated: National Volunteer of the Year Award)

Kate is definitely one of our most dedicated, flexible and all-round wonderful volunteers! If you're looking for an experienced, enthusiastic volunteer to run an activity in your classroom, Kate's your girl! She brings her wealth of experience working with kids and her enthusiasm for teaching and scientific communication to every activity she runs -- and it shows! Educators have nothing but good things to say after Kate visits their classroom, and the kids can't stop asking when she'll be back! Thanks KATE!! :)

Q . What are you studying and what have you studied in the past?
A. I am currently finishing my MSc in Epidemiology. I completed an undergraduate degree in Biomedical Sciences. In September I will begin my PhD in Epidemiology!

Q . What has been your favourite part of volunteering (or what is the best activity that you've done so far)?
A. I love the opportunity to work with kids! I used to teach swimming lessons and I gave that up when I started grad school. Now I have the opportunity to work with children again, teach something that I love and hopefully inspire a few bright young minds to consider a career in science. What could be more fun!?

Q. Why did you become a Let's Talk Science volunteer?

A. I became a let's Talk Science volunteer for a number of reasons! The main reasons were to work with kids, teach science and meet other graduate students at my university. The somewhat more selfish reasons that are still valid are to build my CV, learn how to communicate science and my research to a different group and build teaching experience. But in the end, I have stayed a volunteer because I LOVE working with LTS at the University of Guelph!

Q. What are your goals for the future?

A. My goals for the future are to start my PhD in September and complete it in 4 years or less. I would like to continue to volunteer with LTS, continue to work as a teaching assistant and maybe even as a sessional instructor! In the end, I would like to be a professor of epidemiology or of climate change and health.


Alex Swirski  (Nominated: National Volunteer of the Year Award)
Alex was a brand new addition to our Let's Talk Science Outreach program in September, but what a great addition to our team! Alex brings enthusiasm to every activity, and she has a great rapport with kids of all ages! Despite only joining the team in September, she quickly became one of our most active volunteers, heading to both local AND rural schools to run hands-on/minds-on activities with kids! Thanks ALEX! :D

Q . What are you studying and what have you studied in the past?
A. My undergraduate degree was in microbiology. I am currently studying epidemiology, looking at how season influences water contamination with Giardia spp. and the impact of season on the incidence of human cases of giardiasis.

Q . What has been your favourite part of volunteering (or what is the best activity that you've done so far)?
A. I love getting kids excited about science! My favourite part of volunteering is when we do the wrap up at the end of the activity and the kids tell you about their favourite part and what part they are going to tell their parents about when they go home. I love seeing the excitement that comes from learning something cool and new.

Q. Why did you become a Let's Talk Science volunteer?

A. My friend suggested that I try it out and I am very glad I did!

Q. What are your goals for the future?

A. I am still trying to figure that out for myself! However, I would love to work for the World Health Organization and help with disease eradication and                                                                                       vaccination programmes.


Keith Poore  (Nominated: CIHR-Synapse Award)
Keith was another new addition to our team in September. He quickly distinguished himself as a dependable volunteer who was willing to help out wherever we needed help most. Within a couple months, he was already offering to design a brand new activity (a disease propagation activity for grades 6+ that you'll see featured on our blog over the summer). For his work in developing this Health-based activity, we nominated him for the CIHR-Synapse Award. Thanks KEITH!

Q . What are you studying and what have you studied in the past?
A. I am currently in my second year of my MSc. in Biophysics. I did my BSc. in Medical Physics at Ryerson University.

Q . What has been your favourite part of volunteering (or what is the best activity that you've done so far)?
A. I like to help others, whether it be learning something new and exciting or just lending a helping hand. When volunteering through Let's Talk Science, I really enjoy the eureka moments students have when they understand a new concept.

Q. Why did you become a Let's Talk Science volunteer?

A. I heard really great things about LTS, from friends who had volunteered. I also like to teach science (at any level), so it seemed like a great opportunity.

Q. What are your goals for the future?

A. I am currently running for Guelph City Council. I also want to do a PhD in either Biophysics, Biomathematics, or Applied Mathematics.

March Break Launch of Our Second Robert Munsch Companion Activity at the Guelph Public Library

Let's Talk SPOOKY Science is officially Famous!

I'm thrilled to announce that our 
Let's Talk SPOOKY Science 
booth at the Elora FrightFest is officially famous! 
(well, "famous" in Wellington County at least)

Check out:

http://www.wellingtonadvertiser.com/comments/index.cfm?articleID=18908

It also caught the attention of head office, who posted a story on the national LTS site:
http://www.letstalkscience.ca/news-and-events/news/1595-let%92s-talk-spooky-science-at-the-elora-frightfest.html

Saturday am: 5 volunteers from Waterloo and I entertained the kiddies.

Saturday night: Katie B, Derek T and Tanya M amped up the spooktacular-ness of our booth with glow in the dark and UV glowing slime!

Sunday: Keith P, Heather G, Shuang L and I mesmerized the masses with mysterious self-inflating (frozen) ghost balloons and hands on, super gross alien snot they could take home!

Way to go! We couldn't have done it without the help of these fabulous volunteers! Thanks everyone! Based on the success of this first run, I'm pretty sure we'll be making it an annual event!

Please spread the word! LTS is running training sessions for new volunteers!

Are you a 3rd or 4th year undergrad, vet or graduate student, staff or faculty? Are you looking for a way to get involved in the community, get to know other grad students in other departments, and/or to share your passion for your field with youth? If you are, Let's Talk Science is looking for you!

Let's Talk Science (www.letstalkscience.ca) is a national not-for-profit organization that pairs university student volunteers with educators across Canada. We are looking for senior undergraduate, graduate and vet student volunteers who can spend 10 hours each year (only 5 hours/semester) volunteering with youth in Guelph and the surrounding area. Though our volunteers are predominantly science, engineering, or math graduate students, all disciplines are welcome! (This means YOU social science students!) 

There are many diverse opportunities for involvement, and our volunteers have many opportunities to develop their communication, presentation and teaching skills (always a bonus for adding to your CV!) in both local and rural/remote communities. Most volunteers engage students with hands-on science activities from our pre-made "kits", but you can also develop and design your own modules around your area of study or special interest, helping to add to our catalog of available activities.

Examples of recent activities include a visit to a Grade 2 class for a Plants & Pollinators game, a competition to build chain-reaction Rube Goldberg machines in a Grade 7 class, monthly library visits for kids' science programs like our Crime Scene Investigator mystery and Chemistry Magic Show, giving a talk at a Philosophy symposium or presenting your research in a Poster Presentation at Science Rendezvous.

 To learn more, come out to one of our 20 minute info sessions in the Science Complex Room 1511: 

Thursday, September 12th, 2013 at 5 pm

Thursday, September 19th, 2013 at 5 pm

 If you're already convinced,  and want to volunteer, you'll first have to attend an orientation and training session. Please RSVP to uguelph@letstalkscience.ca for one of the following training sessions in the Science Complex Room 1511:

Thursday, September 12th, 2013 from 5:30-7:30 pm

Thursday, September 19th, 2013 from 5:30-7:30 pm

Wednesday, October 9th, 2013 from 11:30 am - 1:30 pm
in the Science Complex Room 1511

If you have any questions or concerns, please email the University of Guelph Let's Talk Science coordinators, Nancy and Ann at uguelph@letstalkscience.ca. To learn more about who we are and what we do at the University of Guelph, please check out our website at www.letstalkscience.ca/uguelph.

Cheers!

Ann & Nancy

Our Fantastic Volunteers!

We've totaled the numbers and tallied the points, and concluded it was yet another fantastic year here at Let's Talk Science at the University of Guelph.

From July 1, 2012 - June 30, 2013, our volunteers conducted over 130 activities and reached over 4100 youth. This amounts to over 1300 hours of volunteer time from our 96 active volunteers!

We'd like to tip our hats to all of our active volunteers, especially our top five volunteers, who volunteered the most number of hours to help reach out to youth in our communities.

1. Linda Jewell - 46 hours

2. Roman Kondra - 39.5 hours including 4 rural activities

3. Marshall Lindner - 36.5 hours including an amazing 8 rural activities!

4. Nick Jeffery - 35 hours

5. Larry Chen - 34.5 hours including 2 rural activities (and Larry only started volunteering in Jan!)

Thanks so much for everyone's help! There is absolutely no way we could make such a difference without y'all!

Cheers to a fantastic year!
And cheers to an even better one coming up!

Congratulations to the Let's Talk Science National Award Finalists!

The annual Let's Talk Science CIHR-Synapse Award recognizes an outstanding, innovative, health research-related activity done by a Let's Talk Science Outreach volunteer or pair of volunteers.

This year, we nominated Sana Khan and Justine Hutchinson for their efforts putting together an activity for Non-Smoking month at the Guelph Public Library. The Let's Talk Science head office agreed that they did an amazing job, and a jury of LTS employees and volunteers included Justine and Sana in the top three finalists for the award.

Congratulations girls

Read more about the 3 finalists and about Sana and Justine's activity here:
http://www.letstalkscience.ca/volunteers/showcase-and-awards/cihr-award-showcase.html

College Royal Open House

Saturday, March 16 and Sunday, March 17 will be the 89th annual College Royal open house weekend at the University of Guelph.

Not to be left out of the festivities, Let's Talk Science will be running some awesome activities in Room 1504 of the Science Complex from 9-5 on Saturday and 9-4 on Sunday.

To visitors:
There will be activities for young and old, so bring the entire crew! We'll have mysterious floating orbs, fruit electrical circuits and super-slime making stations = fantastic fun with a tiny slice of science. (But trust us, your kids will hardly even realize they're learning something! And you might learn something too!)

To volunteers:
The more volunteers the merrier, so let us know if you can stop by for a couple hours!

Guelph Coordinator Announcement!

Hi Let's Talk Science volunteers,

Happy New Year! I hope that you had time to relax with friends and family during the break!

I am very sad to say that my (Linda's) time as coordinator has come to an end. I will still be around as a volunteer, but I will no longer be a coordinator. I would like to take a moment to say a huge THANK YOU to all of you! I am really going to miss working with all of you, but I'm looking forward to having the time to volunteer alongside you more often!

Please continue reading below for an introduction from Ann and Nancy (the new coordinators who will be joining Amanda!), announcements about the winter semester training dates (in case you have friends or labmates who would like to volunteer!), and some upcoming activities in the weeks to come.

Best wishes,
Linda

It's Rural Week!

Whew! We've been so busy lately that it's been hard to keep up with the blog! Stay tuned for another post soon about some of the other amazing things we've been up to!

Our beautiful spring weather has meant the return of rural trips! Now that we don't need to worry about school closures or unsafe road conditions, our volunteers have hit the road, to bring science to kids in three rural communities in this week alone!! Derek, Midori, and Mary paid a return visit to St. Peter's school in Dublin, ON, to teach the grade 1/2 students about simple machines, and to show the kids how to make Cheerio-a-pults (sorry parents :p)!! Bryce and Erin are spending most of the day today in Arthur to discuss why matter matters, to teach the grade 4's about pulleys, and to talk to the kindergartens about why science and math are cool! And Karen and Crystal are off to Maryborough to perform some chemistry magic, to deliver some super science challenges, and to teach the grade 1's about energy in their everyday lives! These three dedicated teams of volunteers have travelled a combined 400 km this week!!! 

Let's Talk.. Philosophy?!

This year, we LTSers at the U of G have made a commitment to bridge the perceived gap between science and the arts! We want to help people recognize that science plays a major role in everything we do - even things without an obvious connection to math or science! So when we were approached by a graduate student in philosophy about putting together a presentation for his philosophy open house, we leapt at the chance! This collaboration was a huge success: we were even featured in an article in our local newspaper, The Guelph Mercury!!

Philopolis is an annual event at the U of G and McGill University that is the brainchild of Brooke Struck, currently a grad student in philosophy here at the U of G. He invited us to put together a panel about philosophy in science. We recruited a team of volunteers and some professors to discuss the species problem - just what exactly is a species anyway, and what are the implications for research in different fields, for politics, and for biodiversity and conservation?  We started off with a hands-on game about how to define species: are these critters just variation within a single species, or are they three different species? 

Five graduate students then presented about how species are used and / or defined in their fields of mycology, botany, conservation biology, and in the contexts of agricultural pest identification and the meaningfulness of model organisms. The presentations were followed by an entertaining debate between professors. The audience responded with some challenging questions, and in the end, I think all of us walked away with a new perspective!

Happy Darwin Day AND an article about LTS at Guelph!

Happy Darwin Day everyone! Today is Charles Darwin's 203rd birthday! To celebrate, why not send e-cards to your friends, family, and colleagues?

We are also very proud to share an article about Let's Talk Science at the U of G that was published online this week in the U of G e-zine, @Guelph! Check it out!

Featured Volunteer Pair - Xin and Ramya

Xin and Ramya began volunteering in the Fall of 2011. They have received rave reviews from the teachers and students who they have worked with thanks to their enthusiasm and creativity!

Q. What are you studying and what have you studied in the past?

Xin:  I went to University of Waterloo to complete my BSc. in Biochemistry/Biotechnology specialization and now I am doing my master study in Environment Biology in University of Guelph.

Ramya: I do have my undergraduate degree in Biotechnology (Engineering)from Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU), India and presently pursuing masters in Bioinformatics at University of Guelph.

Q. What has been your favourite part of volunteering (or what is the best activity that you've done so far)?

Xin: The best part of this experience is to see the smiles from every single kids, and get them to like science even when they are young. Learning science can be so enjoyable if the fun ideas are introduced to all those kids, which is why I am so thankful that they have this program to cover kids from age 6-17. Teaching the kids to appreciate science and not just some boring formula in chemistry, or nasty animals that scare them. 

I only had chance to volunteer with one activity, which is budding science that talked about how insects and birds adapt to their habitats. This activity was great because it allows the kids to have hands on experience to "become a bird" when feeding and to build their own insects.

Ramya: The excitement and happiness in each young scientist(kid) after there hands on activity.

The All Science Challenge is Coming!

Can you believe that it's already time to start thinking about the 2012 All Science Challenge?? The All Science Challenge is a one-day science showdown for kids in grades 6-8.  Students study a handbook of reach-ahead science facts prepared by a team of educational experts and volunteers. On the big day, the students will compete against teams from other area schools for the title of All Science Challenge Champion!! All Science Challenges are hosted by Let's Talk Science sites across Canada, and this year will be Guelph's second time hosting this fun day of friendly competition and teamwork! The All Science Challenge at the University of Guelph will take place on April 24th, 2012.

If you know a student in grades 6-8 in the Guelph area who might be interested in competing, have his or her teacher visit http://www.letstalkscience.ca/challenge to register a team!

Featured Volunteer - Jan Edward

Jan is an amazingly passionate and dedicated volunteer who began working with Let's Talk Science at the start of the 2010-2011 school year! He has visited schools and community groups within Guelph and in rural areas like Dublin, and he performed an amazing 10 activities last year! 

Q. What are you studying and what have you studied in the past?

A.I did my undergraduate degree in Wildlife Biology in Guelph and I loved it so much that I am still here pursuing my MSc degree studying stress neuroendocrinology.

Q. Why did you become a Let's Talk Science volunteer?

A. Science has always been a passion of mine. Science is practically everywhere in today's world. It is transforming our world in a rapid pace. However, Science is under appreciated. I volunteered for Let's Talk Science to pass on my passion to younger students and at the very least, for the students to gain an appreciation for Science. I believe that  being able to understand the importance of science in our everyday lives is not only an advantage but a necessity. More importantly, I want everyone to know that Science is fun!

Q. What has been your favourite part of volunteering (or what is the best activity that you've done so far)?

A. One of my most memorable Let's Talk Science experience is visiting schools in rural areas. The students are very excited to have us visit their school as they have very few visitors in the school year. This makes the long trip very rewarding. As rural students do not have the same level of access to science programming as urban students, I feel that these trips makes a huge impact as far as science outreach goes.

Past Featured Volunteers:

• Derek
• Kaity

New Year, New Coordinator, New Volunteers.. Same Fun!

Can you believe that it's already September?!? The new school year is ready to start, and Let's Talk Science at the U of G is ramping up for another super fun, super successful year!

We have grown from one coordinator to two! This year, Linda will be joined by a second PhD student from the U of G, Amanda, who will help out with connecting volunteers to teachers and educators! Amanda is also heading up an amazing DNA Barcoding activity (more on that another day!). 

This fall, we are offering several information and training sessions to help bring new graduate students into the program! The information sessions are an optional way for you to learn a little bit more about the program and what we are looking for volunteers to commit to. Attendance at a training session is MANDATORY before we can let you go out into classrooms and community groups!

Information sessions will be held:

Tuesday, September 13th at 2:00pm in the GreenhouseCafe, Bovey Bldg.

Tuesday,September 20th at 4:30 pm in 1800 Pathobiology

Thursday, October 6th at 4:30 pm in 1714Lifetime Learning Centre

Monday, October17th at 4:30 pm in 1714Lifetime Learning Centre

Training sessions will be held:

Tuesday, September 20th from 5-8 pm in 1800 Pathobiology

Thursday, October 6th from 5-8 pm in 1714Lifetime Learning Centre

Monday, October17th from 5-8 pm in 1714Lifetime Learning Centre 

I hope you can join us for another awesome year!

2010-2011 Award Winning Volunteers!

I can't believe it's the end of the school year already! Things have finally started to quiet down (except for the activities from summer schools and community groups!), which means that it's time to name this year's volunteer and activity of the year award recipients! On June 30th, we had a volunteer appreciation and awards night to honour the hard work of all of our fantastic volunteers.

The first award that was distributed was the Activity of the Year Award, which is given to the volunteer (or volunteers!) who develop and exceptionally creative, useful, and detailed activity.  The winners of this year's Activity of the Year Award were Nick S. and Angie R. for their activity about pulleys and levers!  Honourable mentions went to Amanda N. for her amazing Barcoding activity and to Adam T., whose anatomy field trip didn't quite see the light of day (but which was still pretty amazing!).

The second award that we distributed was the Christopher Zweerman Volunteer of the Year Award, which is given to a volunteer who has demonstrated a tremendous amount of passion, dedication, and creativity. This award is named in honour of the U of G's first Volunteer of the Year, Christopher Zweerman, who tragically passed away in 2010. We chose to name the award in his honour because he exemplified all of the qualities that make for a fantastic volunteer.
The winner of the 2010-2011 Christopher Zweerman Volunteer of the Year Award is Midori B., who not only performed an astounding 15 activities, but who also traveled to rural communities, developed new activities, and lent a hand with the All Science Challenge!  Honourable mentions went to Jan (Edward) L., who was also an amazingly dedicated volunteer who spent an enormous number of hours working both in Guelph and in rural communities; to Derek T., who single-handedly managed one of our busiest partnerships (and still found time to do other activities!); and to Kaity R., who not only had a hand in Adam's developing field trip activity, but who also performed several activities and who stepped up when other volunteers became unavailable on short notice.

We also had several volunteers who were nominated for national awards!!  Lisa W. was nominated for the National Volunteer of the Year Award due to her creativity, strong teaching skills, and dedication.  She is an outstanding volunteer! The CIHR Synapse award recognizes an outstanding activity in the field of health science. Amanda W. and Marina N. were nominated for this award based on their fantastic activity about microbes, and they were national finalists for this award!!

Thank you SO MUCH to all of the amazing volunteers this year! We really achieved some amazing things this year, and none of it would have been possible without you!

The All Science Challenge!!

After months of preparation, on Thursday, May 26th, the U of G hosted its first ever All Science Challenge!! Ten teams of students in grades 6-8 from five area schools competed for the top prize! All of the volunteers, teachers, and spectators were absolutely blown away by the questions that the students were answering! The kids worked their brains off to prepare for the big day, and their hard work really paid off! All of the competitors, whether they won or not, can be extremely proud of how they performed.

A HUGE thank you is owed to a huge number of people! In no particular order:

• Thank you to our fantastic sponsors for providing many of the materials and prizes!!
• Thank you to the national office of Let's Talk Science for their organization and support!
• Thank you to all of the volunteers who worked so hard to make the big day a success!
• Thank you to all of the teachers who worked overtime to help their students prepare!
• Thank you to the friends and families of the competitors for their support, both in advance and on the big day!
• And, of course, thank you to the competitors, who spent many hours working to study the All Science Challenge handbook!

To see all the photos that were taken on the big day, check out our Picasa album. Keep reading to hear about the big day!

Rural outreach in Dublin, Ontario AND a major milestone!

Dublin, Ontario is a small town about 90 minutes away from Guelph.  A team of four volunteers braved early morning traffic and snowy roads to visit the grade 1 and 2 students at St. Patrick's to show them how much fun science can be!

The grade 2's learned how the familiar structures in a playground - slides, merry-go-rounds, and teeter-totters - are really simple machines! They built playground models to show off to their friends and families! The grade 1's learned about structures, and tested whether a suspension bridge was stronger than one without support wires (dental floss!). Then they built geodisic domes using only newspaper!

The kids and the volunteers all had a blast, as evidenced by the photos passed along by the teacher!

Nicole showing how a playground is really a collection of simple machines.

The dedicated volunteers - Sonya, Jan, Mary, and Nicole.

What makes this trip even more special is that, when we tallied up the number of youth reached in this visit, we realized that we had hit a milestone... we have now reached our goal for number of youth reached in the 2010-2011 school year! That's right: as of today, Let's Talk Science in Guelph has reached over 1,500 kids!! This amazing feat would not have been possible without the sincere dedication of volunteers like Mary, Sonya, Nicole, and Jan, as well as the enthusiasm of our community and educator partners!

Guelph Let's Talk Science hanging out with Stephen Harper!!

Yup, that incredible title is true: on Friday, March 11th a team of LTS volunteers from the U of G and UWaterloo visited St. Ignatius school here in Guelph for a normal, run of the mill roller coaster engineering challenge with the grade 6's that culminated in PRIME MINISTER STEPHEN HARPER dropping by to test out the kids' fantastic designs. No big deal. That's just how we roll here in Guelph.

This activity was followed by an incredible announcement: the PM has dedicated $2,000,000 across 4 years to Let's Talk Science in Southern Ontario through Fed-Dev Ontario's Youth STEM program!!!! How ridiculously fantastic is that?!?!?

This incredible announcement was front page news here in Guelph, and it was also covered by several national news sources and at the PM's own website.  Plenty of photos are coming soon so stay tuned!

News articles about the announcement and the PM's visit:

• The Prime Minister's website
• The Guelph Mercury
• CTV News

Edit:  Photos after the jump!  To see all of the high-res photos, check out our picasa album!

Mr. Landoni's amazing grade 6's.. with a special guest!