Newsletter No. 20 - July 19, 2010  |
Festival Dates: Expo Dates:
10/10/10
- 10/24/10 10/23 & 10/24
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Wanted: Volunteers for the
Expo!
Volunteers will be an essential part in making the USA Science &
Engineering Festival Expo on the National Mall and surrounding areas a
success. Please sign up now if you would like to help. Assignments
vary, and are designed to work with your schedule: sign up for one shift
on one day, or for multiple shifts throughout both days.
Please
note: You must attend a volunteer training session in the afternoon of
Sunday, October 17. The training session will be held on the National
Mall from 2-3:30pm for those of you who will be assigned to working on
the National Mall. For those of you who will be assigned to working in
the Wilson Plaza/Penn Ave. section of the Expo, the training session
will be held from 4-5:30pm in Wilson Plaza. You will be notified in due
time. Training will be held rain or shine. If you are unavailable at
that time, you must participate in a conference call the week of October
18- date and time TBD.
As a volunteer, you receive our undying
gratitude, a Festival T-shirt, and the satisfaction that you helped make
the biggest celebration of science in the US a huge success! Please
read descriptions below. Click here to sign-up
Strong Guys and Gals needed for Exhibitor Move-in Number
of Volunteers needed: 100 When: Saturday, October 23, 6am-10am What:
Help exhibitors transport items from their drop-off location to their
booths; help hang banners or provide other assistance as needed
Profile:
Must be able to lift and carry heavy boxes and/or operate hand-trucks
Sign up here!
Strong Guys and Gals needed for Exhibitor
Move-out Sunday evening Number of Volunteers needed: 100 When: Sunday, October 24, 5:30-6:30pm What: Help exhibitors take down
signage, carry items from booths to vehicles, assist with breakdown as
needed Sign up here! Friday evening Move-in Assitants Needed Number of Volunteers Needed: 25 When: Friday Evening October 22, 5:30-10:30pm What: Assist with monitoring traffic in/out of National Mall at
4th Street & Penn. Ave, assist with exhibitor set-up as needed Sign up here! Smiling Faces needed for Information Booths Number
of volunteers needed: 44 per day (4 per shift for the 5 info booths
plus 2 per shift for the T-shirt stand) When: 4-hour shifts
throughout Saturday and Sunday, October 23 and 24, 10am-5:30pm Shift
1: 9:45am-1:45pm Shift 2: 1:30pm-5:30pm What: Provide general Expo
information to attendees; hand out maps, answer questions etc. - this
is a fun job if you are a people-person! Sign up here!
More Smiling Faces Needed as Ambassadors
Number
of volunteers needed: 200 per day (100 per shift) When: 4-hour
shifts throughout Saturday and Sunday, October 23 and 24, 10am-5:30pm Shift
1: 9:45am-1:45pm Shift 2: 1:30pm-5:30pm What: Stationed
throughout the Expo grounds and at shuttle bus stops, Ambassadors will
provide general info to Expo-goers, hand out maps, and direct people to
nearest restrooms, medical tent or info booth for more information Sign up here!
Assistant Stage Managers Needed Number
of Volunteers Needed: 16 (1 per stage per shift) When: 4-hour shifts
throughout Saturday and Sunday, October 23 and 24, 10am-5:30pm Shift
1: 9:45-1:45 Shift 2: 1:30pm-5:30pm What: Assist Stage Manager,
assist performers with set-up, assist with crowd control Sign up here! Additional Volunteer Opportunities: You CAN do the Rubiks Cube The You CAN Do the Rubik's Cube Team is in need of 10 volunteers to help
with the preliminary tournament on Wednesday, October 20 and/or
Thursday, October 21, 2-8pm. Where: National Electronics Museum, 1745
West Nursery Road, Linthicum Heights, MD. 21090
You Can Do the
Rubik's Cube is also looking for 6 volunteers (3 per day) to help at
their booth- you do not need to know how to solve the Rubik's Cube to
help. Click here to sign up.
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If You Could Make One New Scientific Discovery or Invention What Would It Be?
It's time for round two! Tell us what scientific invention or discovery you'd like to make and we will turn your answers into a beautiful Word Cloud! Submit your answers and see the results in the next newsletter! Deadline to submit is DATE.
An image of our first Wordle which asked: Who is your favorite scientist of all time?
 | Help us spread the word: - Forward this question and link to your friends or post it on Facebook.
- Collect your students' answers and enter them into the form.
Have ideas for questions we should ask the nation? Submit them here.
To find out more about Wordles and to create your own clouds go to www.wordle.net
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You CAN Do
The Rubik's Cube Tournament:
Free Teacher Workshop Just
Announced!
Register
now for the YCDTRC contest and attend a free teacher/coach workshop on
August 14th from 1pm - 3:30 pm at The National Electronics Museum.
Student names are not due until October 1st!
The Rubik's Cube
Tournament will place K-12 teams in competition for the fastest time to
collectively solve 25 Rubik's Cubes. The top six finalists will compete
for the championship at the USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo
on the National Mall on 10/23. Prizes range from $100 to $1,000 and will
be awarded by Dr. Erno Rubik, inventor of the Rubik's Cube
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A Perfect Partner: Double Feature!
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A Perfect Partner: From the Civil War to Modern Day - NMHM Takes Festival Goers on an Insightful Journey into Medical History

Trauma surgery...emergency medicine...forensic anthropology. We know them today as invaluable fields in medicine and science - fields that save lives or provide important insight into the circumstances behind a traumatic death. What you may not know is that these professions, in many ways, were literally born under fire on the battlefields of war - from the Civil War to the conflict in Vietnam - where physicians and other medical professionals, working under dire conditions, often had to make quick decisions in diagnosing and treating severely wounded soldiers. Take a look at this intriguing part of military medicine history and other compelling aspects of medicine's past and future with our most recent Festival "Perfect Partner" -- the National Museum of Health and Medicine/AFIP (NMHM), a Department of Defense museum located on the campus of Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. Through its three engaging Expo exhibits this fall, NMHM experts will not only take you back into medical history, but will also show how the past has contributed to progress in contemporary medical science.  However, the Museum's participation in the Festival does not stop there! In October, it is also hosting the Nifty Fifty school presentation of Franklin Damann, anatomical curator at NMHM, and the performance of the Cosmic Tenors, a dynamic singing trio comprised of noted astrophysicists - James Gates of the University of Maryland, Larry Gladney of the University of Pennsylvania, and Herman White from the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. "Having the opportunity to share the excitement of medicine, medical history and science with students, teachers and the public through the Festival and Expo is particularly exhilarating for us at the National Museum of Health and Medicine," says Adrianne Noe, Director of the Museum. In fact, she says, the Museum began in March promoting the Festival when NMHM sponsored an Albert Einstein dramatization event during their celebration of Brain Awareness Week. "We announced the Festival there and started to get people interested in attending this fall," she says.  Tim Clarke, NMHM Deputy Director of Communications, adds: "The Museum's Expo presentations will especially give visitors an interesting look at how things have changed in the last 50 or 100 years in the way, for example, diseases are diagnosed and treated, how broken bones are healed and how surgery is performed." Festival goers will also learn some great things about anatomy, pathology and the inner workings of the human body, says Tim (who has been doing a great job spreading the word about the Festival and Expo through Twitter and other social media!).
Don't miss these NMHM exhibits:
- Visibly Human - About the Human Body. Explore the inner workings of the human body while interacting with intriguing plastinated human organs, real human bones and other specimens and artifacts from the Museum's Historical and Anatomical Collections. Images from the Museum's vast photographic archive will illustrate the advances in modern medicine.
- Binding Up the Nation's Wounds - Military Medicine From the Civil War to Today. Learn the origins of the NMHM - the nation's renowned medical museum. Watch a demonstration of a Civil War-era amputation, and look into the future of military medicine as you learn about technological advances that are improving medical care for our nation's military personnel.
- Connect the Bones - Forensic Identification of War Dead. Become a forensic anthropologist for a day! From a set of bones, determine such information about the person as estimation of age, sex, height, race and the type of trauma that caused death. Learn about the history of using forensic anthropology to identify war dead.
We thank the National Museum of Health and Medicine and our other valued Sponsors as they join us in our goal of inspiring the next generation of scientists and engineers!
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A Perfect Partner: DC WeatherFest Coalition Uses 'Common Thread' to Link Multiple Institutions in Exploring Weather, Water and Climate
The DC Weather  Fest Coalition is a partnership of government, scientific societies, private enterprise, and institutions in education which focuses on serving as an important resource for information on weather, water, and climate, and how these impact our lives. Recognized as a "Perfect Festival Partner" for its noted efforts in the event, the Coalition is especially cited by the Festival for assembling an impressive array of exhibits -- including those by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the American Meteorological Society -- all under the common theme, or strand, of atmospheric and oceanic science. This "common thread" concept is a great way not only to add depth and excitement to exhibits and presentations, but also to allow Expo visitors to explore related topics from different perspectives. Using this approach to examining the wonders and mystery of weather, water and climate certainly adds intrigue and excitement to the many hands-on exhibits sponsored by DC WeatherFest Coalition partners, says Elizabeth Mills, a Coalition representative who serves as Associate Director, Education Programs at the American Meteorological Society. WeatherBug Mascot
 | For example, she says, "visitors in one area of our exhibits can be interviewed on camera, in another explore a weather station, and in others learn about the latest in weather research," and in other exhibits, "they can see, first-hand, the instrumentation used in the ocean and understand the way climate is changing, or watch their kids being entertained by the WeatherBug mascot." Ron Gird, NOAA National Weather Service Outreach Program Manager adds, "Visitors will take away knowledge of how to access critical weather, water and climate information to protect lives and property. Information on careers and educational opportunities will also be available." Organizations with exhibits in the WeatherFest Coalition include: the American Meteorological Society (with AWS WeatherBug, WJLA-TV, and News Channel 8); Alliance for Climate Education; American Geophysical Union; American Society of Limnology and Oceanography; National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the National Weather Service; George Mason University; and National Earth Science Teachers Association. The DC WeatherFest Coalition is also represented by organizations and institutions on its Festival Executive Committee (many which will have volunteers at booth areas). These include: CSC, Federal Aviation Administration - NextGen Integration & Implementation; Howard University; HowThe WeatherWorks; ITT; Johns Hopkins University; Lockheed Martin; NASA; Noblis; Raytheon, and the University of Maryland. We have noticed that Festival partners, in addition to the DC WeatherFest Coalition, have also made use of use of the "common thread" concept in their exhibits, such as the "Evolution Thought Trail" in its exhibits covering evolution. If your institution or organization would like to sponsor a "common thread" track for the Expo, or if you have ideas for a track, please email biobock@mac.com. |
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THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS
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NuVasive - FEI Company Case Western Reserve University- LifeStrawMicrosoft - Draper Laboratory Colella Photography Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp
Silicon Valley Bank - Bechtel National Radio Astronomy Observatory Space X - Research In Motion SciVee - SchoolTube Thirty Meter Telescope Project Astronomy Outreach Foundation Virginia Commonwealth University School
of Engineering National Math and Science Initiative Rochester Institute of Technology SpringBoard, a Program of the Juneau
Economic Development Council |
Visit us online at www.usasciencefestival.org
New logo design by MORRIS
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Festival Host:
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Buy a Festival T-shirt Buy 10 or more and get 15% off Go to store

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Science is Cool and The Kavli Foundation is challenging K-12 students to explain why.
Submit your video now for a chance to win cash and electronics prizes! Click here for more info
In partnership with

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Register your team for our You Can Do the Rubik's Cube Tournament Click here for more info
In partnership with

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Engineering.com is partnering with The USA Science Festival to bring you "The Great Science Teacher Video Contest" Are you a great science teacher? Prove it! Submit your video now for a chance to win cash and electronics prizes! Click here for more info
In partnership with

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Are you a Fan of the Festival? Tell others by posting our "I am a Fan" Logo on your Facebook page, website, blog or wherever else you share information.
The logo is available for download on our "Resources" page

In return, we will gladly post a link to your site. Provide us with your basic info and your Fan "ShoutOut" about the Festival, and we will add you to our website... Click here to fill out a brief form
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Sponsorship Opportunities
Help us create the largest celebration of science and engineering in the World.
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Be part of the National Celebration: Host a Satellite Event in Your Community Find out how | |