Feb. 26th KTU right around the corner

Hi everyone,

Over the next 3 weeks we will be posting information about the upcoming Feb. 26th program. In order for me not to bombard your email inbox I'm only going to send reminders to visit this site once a week...but there will be updates at least once a day on this site!

Please come back often!

Dr. Reinhard Laubenbacher- storyteller for Jan. 29th KTU!

January 29, 2011
“Patterns are Everywhere! How and Why?”

A storytelling session led by Dr. Reinhard Laubenbacher

Did you know that we are surrounded by patterns--everywhere? For example, farmers need to understand weather patterns to plan their harvests. Your parents need to understand traffic patterns to drive you to school safely. Music and dance excite us through patterns of sounds and movement. Some patterns are pretty easy to spot, like the pattern on seashell, or the pattern on a snowflake. However, other patterns around us aren’t so easy to see, like the patterns on a pine cone, or the patterns of ocean waves. I’ll bet you wouldn’t guess patterns exist in clouds! To discover some of these patterns, we need to be very, very observant. So join me and together we’ll hunt down some patterns in the world around us--and as we investigate how these patterns form and why they’re there, the answers may surprise you!

Dr. Laubenbacher has been a Professor at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and a Professor in the Department of Mathematics at Virginia Tech since 2001. He is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Cancer Biology at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem (NC) and Affiliate Faculty in the Virginia Tech Wake Forest University School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences. Prior to these appointments Dr. Laubenbacher was Professor of Mathematics at New Mexico State University. He has served as Visiting Faculty at Los Alamos National Laboratories, was a member of the Mathematical Science Research Institute at Berkeley in 1998, and was a Visiting Associate Professor at Cornell University in 1990 and 1993. Current interests in Dr. Laubenbacher’s research group include the development of mathematical algorithms and their application to problems in systems biology, in particular the modeling and simulation of molecular networks. An application area of particular interest is cancer systems biology, especially the role of iron metabolism in breast cancer.

Virginia Tech 2011 KTU program

Hello everyone,

I'm pleased to announce the launching of the 2011 KTU program! The program is open to 450 children (ages 9-12 on Sept. 30, 2010) from a 4 hour driving radius around VT. Please see the KTU website for more information about the storytelling sessions, dates of the program, registration fee and enrollment information!

January 29, 2011 -- “Patterns are Everywhere! How and Why?”
Storytelling session led by Dr. Reinhard Laubenbacher
Professor at Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and of the Department of Mathematics, Virginia Tech
Did you know that we are surrounded by patterns--everywhere? For example, farmers need to understand weather patterns to plan their harvests. Your parents need to understand traffic patterns to drive you to school safely. Music and dance excite us through patterns of sounds and movement. Some patterns are pretty easy to spot, like the pattern on seashell, or the pattern on a snowflake. However, other patterns around us aren’t so easy to see, like the patterns on a pine cone, or the patterns of ocean waves. I’ll bet you wouldn’t guess patterns exist in clouds! To discover some of these patterns, we need to be very, very observant. So join me and together we’ll hunt down some patterns in the world around us--and as we investigate how these patterns form and why they’re there, the answers may surprise you!

February 26, 2011 - “Why are glaciers in Antarctica important to people who
live in Virginia?”
Storytelling session led by Dr. Ellen Cowan
Professor of Geology, Appalachian State University

Geologists know that Virginia wasn’t covered by glaciers even at the peak of the last Ice Age in North America, approximately 20,000 years ago. Yet there are many reasons that we can appreciate glaciers and the work that they do on Earth. Glaciers sculpt beautiful and distinctive landscapes that we see around the world in mountains and in Polar Regions. Antarctica is a vast continent almost completely covered by ice. How has the Antarctic ice sheet responded to past changes in climate? We can use clues from rock layers, fossils and gas bubbles in ice to study the history of Antarctica’s glaciers. With this information we can estimate the affects of a warmer world on Antarctica’s ice and determine the affects far away in Virginia.

March 26, 2011 - “Why do we care about frogs’ health?”
Storytelling session led by Dr. Tyrone Hayes
Professor of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley

We live in a world full of chemicals. They’re used to preserve and flavor food, help plants grow, kill bugs and other pests, dye fabrics and clean our homes. Chemicals help us in many aspects of our everyday lives. While some chemicals are not harmful to us, our pets, or the Earth, some can actually hurt our environment if not used properly. Our program will explore the world of chemical pollution and the many ways chemicals can be both helpful and harmful. We will examine the impacts chemicals can have on people, animals. Where are these chemicals coming from? How have frog populations, other animals, and humans suffered? And what can be done to help the frogs and improve our own health?

April 9, 2011 - “Why do we want to touch everything with our fingertips? And more ‘why’ questions about how our bodies communicate with the world.”
Storytelling session led by Dr. Helena Carvalho
Assistant Professor of Basic Sciences, Virginia Tech Carilion School of Medicine and Research Institute

Are you the type of person that needs to touch everything? Sometimes it feels like we must touch to see better...doesn’t it? It’s fascinating to learn about how our human bodies connect to the world. Do you think the world is what we see? The answer is, “NO!” There are many more “things” in the world than our senses could possibly detect! In this storytelling session we will be discussing and experiencing the Special Senses. Have you ever wondered: Why do we have two eyes on our faces? Or, why do we have two ears on our heads? And why do we stop feeling our clothes after a while? Or why can we not smell our perfume all day? Those and more questions will be answered in our interactive session. Let’s explore together how our human body connects to the outside environment and learn more about the intriguing world of Human Function.

Best,
Dr. Kristy (DiVittorio) Collins

On to March 20th!

Hi everyone,

The Feb. 27th KTU program is complete and we here at KTU headquarters are getting everything reorganized and ready for the March 20th program. For this month's program we will be in a new hands-on venue! Sorry parents and kids, you'll have to wait until next Friday to find out where in your overview of day document!

The program on March 20th is centered on the discipline of science! Dr. Guillette will be giving the lecture and VT clubs and departments will be exhibiting science orientated hands-on activities. We will start posting the exhibitor abstracts tomorrow!

Below is title and abstract for the lecture on March 20, 2010-

“Why do we need alligators in the swamp?” - Answered by Dr. Lou Guillette

Lecture abstract: We live in a modern world and wonder, “why do we still have dangerous animals?” Why do we need animals – like the alligator – living in our swamps? We will explore the world of the alligator and why these animals are not only important to the swamp, but what they can tell us about the world we live in. We will discuss the concept of a “keystone species” and a “sentinel species.” A keystone species is one that other animals depend on and, if lost from our world, would lead to major changes in the environment. A sentinel species can be used to inform us about the health of a population or environment. We will learn just how the alligator is helping make a safer and cleaner environment for all of us.

Dr. Lou Guillette is a Distinguished Professor of Biology at the University of Florida (UF), Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Professor, and director of the HHMI UF G.A.T.O.R. Program. His research is concentrated in three main areas: 1. Influence of contaminants on the developmental and reproductive biology of wildlife and humans, 2. Endangered species reproduction, and 3. Evolution of maternal-fetal chemical communication.

Dr. Benjamin on the Colbert Report!

Dr. Art Benjamin, who will giving a talk at Kids' Tech University on Saturday will be on Comedy Central's Colbert Report on Wednesday, Jan. 27th at 10:30 pm! The show is being taped and aired on Wednesday; the next day he is flying to Roanoke to come here!

Tune in!

Dr. Guillette on a science expedition!

Last year Dr. Guillette gave a lecture at Kids' Tech on “Why are plastic bottles bad for alligators?" In his lecture he talked about how plastics are used in everyday life and how they may have an effect on our environment. We learned which plastics might create problems and what people from around the world are doing to make a safer and cleaner environment for themselves and the animals that live around them. Dr. Guillette showed us what it looks like to take a helicopter ride around the swamp and taught us how to spot an alligator nest. This semester he will be giving a lecture on March 20th at Kids' Tech on “Why do we need alligators in the swamp?”

Last semester Dr. Guillette promised to send us pictures of himself on one of his science expeditions. The picture below was taken at the end of the space shuttle landing runway at NASA. Dr. Guillette is sitting on top of a 10.5 ft male gator. Boy, that is one nice looking t-shirt he has!!

KTU website launched!

After a lot of hard work, we are launching the 2010 KTU website!! On the site you will find the speakers for next year and information on registration, FAQ's for the parents and much more!

http://kidstechuniversity.vbi.vt.edu

Chi Delta Alpha volunteers for KTU!

Chi Delta Alpha is the only all-female community service sorority at Virginia Tech. Their mission statement entails that they are "dedicated to the community through unselfish service." They have over 40 active sisters this semester, each doing 25 service hours or more. Chi Delta Alpha participates in over 50 different service projects throughout the community and New River Valley. Service projects include, special olympics bowling and swimming, Kid's Night Out at the women's center, food banks, humane societies, tutoring programs and much more. They even attended a Habitat for Humanity trip this past January, where 24 girls worked for a week on the construction of homes in West Palm Beach Florida.

If you want any more information about them, feel free to check out there website visit: http://www.chideltaalpha.org.vt.edu.
_________________

Chi Delta Alpha Sisters,

On behalf of KTU and the students and parents attending KTU, I would like to say thank you for all you dedicated service! KTU would not exist without volunteers like yourselves.

Thank you,
Kristy

update on the happenings

Hi!

We are getting ready for another KTU event on March 28th! Volunteers are being oriented, name tags are being made and the clipboards are being assembled!! Its a rush of activity! I've been posting a lot of information about the exhibits that will be available for the kids and parents to see during the KTU afternoon hands-on event. Its really going to be a lot of fun and I have more to post so stay tuned.

We will be moving the lecture hall again to another place on campus. We will be having pizza like we had last time for the kids. For the parents there will be an option for them to purchase 3 pieces of pizza and a soda for 7 dollars or a drink for 2 dollars from Personal Touch Catering (they only take CASH). It seemed like this worked out really well for everyone.

The KTU t-shirts will be available to pick up at the March 28th event! We hope all the kids will want to wear them on April 18th!

Thank you for reading!
Kristy

Inaugural KTU Film Festival!

Dr. Caitlin Kelleher did a wonderful job showing the kids how to use the www.alice.org Story Telling Alice computer programming software on Feb. 28th during her lecture, "Why are computer programs so frustrating?". This software provides a great opportunity to bring children together and cultivate imagination to produce movies! In order to encourage this we are sponsoring the first KTU Film Festival with screenings and awards on April 18th! Currently we are organizing the kids into groups and working on obtaining a panel of judges for the movies.

We can't wait to see what the kids produce!

Feb. 28th KTU

The Feb. 28th KTU went extremely well! There were a lot of "ohhhs" and "ahhhs" from the kids during Dr. Kelleher's lecture, "Why are computer programs so frustrating?"  The kids seemed to have loved the pizza; it was a huge hit and we are planning on having that option again next time! The Armored Hokie was a huge hit!

Today, Virginia Bioinformatics Institute released a press release of the Feb. 28th program.

We would like to say thank you to the Armored Hokie, Virginia Tech's Ware Lab, Virginia Tech Amateur Radio Association, Virginia Tech's Assistive Technologies, Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, Computer Science Community Service (CS Squared), Virginia Tech Collegiate 4-H Club, Virginia 4-H Rockbridge and Craig counties, Sigma Alpha, Joon Lee, VT-STEM, Dr. Alex Leonessa, VT Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Dr. Betsy Tretola and Dr. John McGee for hosting exhibits for the kids. Thank you all!

VT Rescue Squad

VT Rescue Squad

The Virginia Tech Rescue Squad is the oldest student run volunteer emergency medical service in the nation. The squad is among a handful of collegiate EMS agencies offering Advanced Life Support transport and is slowly becoming one of the last all volunteer agencies left in collegiate EMS. It has been the model for developing rescue squads at many Universities throughout the United States. In the past thirty years the VTRS has grown from four members certified in first aid to a fully equipped Advanced Life Support Agency with three vehicles and over thirty members. Virginia Tech Rescue Squad are all-volunteer and student-run, and we respond to emergency calls on the Virginia Tech campus 24/7. We also provide standby coverage at large sporting events like football and basketball games, and also other, smaller events (like KTU).

The VT Rescue Squad has provided support for KTU by sending three trained, professional EMTs. These EMTs are at KTU in case there are any issues where a child (or parent) needs emergency medical help...or a band aide! The VT Rescue Squad does not charge for their services and has been nice enough to donate their time to insure that our students are safe.

Parents can make donations to the squad on the website http://www.rescue.vt.edu/donations_funding.php

Carpooling service available

At the last KTU event it was suggested that we should incorporate a way for the parents of the children involved with Kids' Tech University to carpool if desired. We are launching this networking capability on the blog. If you would like your county and email posted as a possible contact please let me (Kristy DiVittorio, kdivitto@vbi.vt.edu) know!

So far, these people are interested in carpooling to the event-

Montgomery County, LauraAC@aol.com
Buckingham County, duggan@kinex.net
Danville, bhpmd2004@yahoo.com


I just wanted to draw your attention to this- Although, I can screen for posting people who have asked me to post them on the blog, this blog is open for anyone to view...so when a "parent" emails you about carpooling please be careful... you can contact me if there are any questions...

Lecture seating in the auditorium...

One of the comments that we had after the last KTU event was that some of the kids who were sat in the back of the auditorium would like to be moved to the front. We do plan on moving the kids around to have them in different seating arrangements at the lecture hall...this way the kids will get to see the lectures from different perspectives... 

Dr. Lou Guillette's abstract posted on the KTU homesite!

Dr. Lou Guillette will be giving a talk to the kids on March 28th about, "Why are plastics bottles bad for alligators?" We just posted his updated abstract on the website and thought we would highlight it- 

"Why are plastic bottles bad for alligators?" by Dr. Lou Guillette

We live in a modern world of plastics. These plastics are used for everything from bike safety helmets to baby bottles. We see how these items help us in our everyday life and we believe they are safe and even make us safer. For example, we believe a plastic bottle is safer than a glass one, as we can get cut on a broken glass bottle. But…..are all these plastics really good for us and the environment? Do we need to learn about the potential dangers of some plastics that are used to store our food? And, why in the world would we think about baby alligators and plastics at the same time? Our program will explore the world of pollution and the many ways plastics can help us, but also potentially hurt the environment, including the health of alligators and us. We will learn which plastics might create problems and what people from around the world are doing to make a safer and cleaner environment for themselves and the animals that live around them.

Jan. 31, 2009 event was a huge hit!

Well, the Jan. 31, 2009 event was a huge hit! We were well organized and got started only about 10 min. late...which is pretty good considering the event included 400 children! Dr. Keith Devlin gave a great talk to the kids (and parents) answering the question, "Why are there animals with spotted bodies and striped tails, but no animal with a striped body and a spotted tail?" The kids loved the Hokiebird...who called during the opening of the lecture and showed up at the back of the lecture hall to say, "Hi!" to the kids. I think the Hokiebird had a great time and just may come back to another KTU event! We also wanted to give a big thanks to all the volunteer EMT's and VT police department members who came out to our event to make sure we were all safe. 

The Kids' Tech University program was featured in the Sunday Roanoke Times article by Greg Esposito- check it out!

The extra lunches left over from the event were given to a local food bank, with the extra water and chips being saved for the next event. 

We will be publishing a schedule for the next event within the next week or so. The lecture will start about 30 min to an hour later and will be at the Hay Market Theatre in Squires on the VT campus. The hands-on activities will include exhibits from departments, centers and student groups around VT campus and the community. Parents will be escorting their children through the exhibits whih will be housed in the Skelton Conference Center on the VT campus. Stay tuned for more information on the Feb. 28th Kids' Tech University event and for information about the many exhibits that well be available to the kids and the parents!

KTU has a volunteer EMT!

We just found out that we secured a volunteer EMT that will be in the lecture hall and in the Math Emporium with the children in case there is an emergency. This is great news!

KTU is 9 days away!

KTU is 9 days away...and boy are we excited about the first event on Jan. 31, 2009. The VBI staff has been working hard on all the name tags for the kids and we have had 2 of our volunteer orientation meetings! Maria (our volunteer coordinator) is busy assigning roles to each volunteer and they will be sent out tomorrow. Of course, about all of volunteers for the program will be with the children. We have a ratio of 1:10 volunteer:to children. This ratio will allow for maximum exposure to the spirit, and safety, of Tech! The police have been invited to the event and I've been told that Boomer and a couple police officers will be at the venue!

Go KTU GO!

Lecture halls for the first day event secured!

This month marks the first Kids' Tech University event on Jan. 31!

We have secured the student auditorium and the parents lecture halls for the Jan. 31 2009 day event! Parents are dropping off the students at the Graduate Life Center auditorium. We STRONGLY encourage the parents to watch the lecture in McBride hall rooms 100, 113 and 129. In the Graduate Life Center the students will be supervised by a volunteer (we have a ratio of 1 volunteer to every 10 students) and will be split into these groups based on their last name. Don't worry, we will have plenty of volunteers, signage and extra campus maps to point everyone around the campus!

A schedule for the Jan. 31 program will be posted later this week!

Graduate Citizen Scholar Engagement supports KTU

Here at Virginia Tech we have a graduate program called "Citizen Scholars". Graduate students from across the campus including Forestry, Chemistry, and Sociology Departments have take part in the program. Participants take academic excellence to the next level by using the knowledge they gained in academia and using it in real world settings while volunteering their time. These graduate students are "Citizen-Scholars" interested in, "Serving the community, the state, the nation, and the world..." The program is a part of the Transformative Graduate Education initiative of the Graduate School at Virginia Tech.

For Kids' Tech University the Graduate Citizen Scholars will be helping with logistics of the program during the day events. They will be interacting with the kids by explaining their research to them and telling them all about what it's like to be a student at Virginia Tech.