Outreach Activities/Highlights

Tom Boggess, Vincent Rodgers, and Lifiana Somantri visit with people at the 2004 Iowa State Fair.

The Free Equipment Give Away Program that is administered through Instructional Resources had its best year ever. Approximately 250 items were given to other schools throughout the state of Iowa.

The Department was one of the featured presenters at the University of Iowa's State Fair Booth again this year with its "Hawk-Eyes on Science" display. Walk-in traffic topped all expectations, creating non-stop action for Tom Boggess, Vincent Rodgers, Dale Stille, and Lifiana Somantri who were staffing the booth and explaining the hands-on demonstrations. One experiment that everyone enjoyed was the Eddy Current demonstration using a large copper plate and 2-inch diameter neodymium magnet. During the entire length of the state fair, the Department also had a presentation entitled, "Exploring Saturn and Mars," which featured the Cassini and Mars Express projects, and included segments on UI space research and student research opportunities in the department.

The Family Adventures in Science series will start up again in the fall with all new physics and astronomy topics. The series is held for a 5 or 6 week period each semester, meeting on Saturdays at 4:00 pm in Van Allen Hall. Check the departmental web site for the latest schedule.

Dale Stille and Usha Mallik have received a grant from the Bauder fund to support "World Year of Physics, 2005" outreach activities. Money from this grant will be used for several presentations in the "Family Adventures in Science" series this fall.