INDUSTRY

There's a perceived shortage of trained, qualified engineers and scientists in the public and private sector, and Nancy Komlanc believes that it may be caused partly by the lack of interest by students in science, technology, and math in the public schools. "High school math students think all you can do with math is learn to teach it," she says. Lisa Ainsworth, a plant biologist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, in a grove of experimental aspens in Rhinelander, Wisconsin. As a participant in TRECC's Professors to Schools program, Ainsworth will be talking to Illinois secondary school students about her work investigating how plants respond to climate change. "The Professors to Schools program is a wonderful opportunity to demonstrate to middle and high school students that research is exciting and relevant to their lives," says Ainsworth. "I'm hoping to spark students' imaginations about major questions and challenges in plant biology and recruit a few more imaginative minds to our discipline." But what of films like Cosmic Voyage and Hunt for the Supertwister? They stunned audiences with their brilliant, scientific-quality visualizations of the first four minutes after the Big Bang and the birth, growth, and devastating impact of an F-3 tornado. "These films depend on mathematics too, but students don't realize it," says Komlanc, director of education and training for the Technology Research, Education, and Commercialization Center (TRECC). In fact, Donna Cox, director of the Advanced Visualization Laboratory at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), collaborated with cosmology and atmospheric science researchers to create both award-winning films. Cox will be one of the participants in TRECC's Professors to Schools Program. Through high-resolution, interactive videoconferencing, the Professors to Schools program will enable University of Illinois faculty to share their passion for what they do with students in middle and high schools across the state of Illinois. "The best way to get students' attention is through awesome and inspiring visualizations of science," says Cox, who will provide a variety of animated digital images. During a typical 30-minute videoconferencing session, students will be able to bring up a browser portal and watch a professor give a presentation or demonstration from his or her office or laboratory. An earthquake engineer might demonstrate how a shake table works and talk about earthquake safety. An astronomer might talk about the process of observing the night sky and analyzing the data from his observations. Meanwhile, students will be able to interact with the subject experts via Web cameras. Many of these webcams have been acquired as a result of the highly successful webcam giveaway program that TRECC has sponsored over the past two years. Schools that have not yet applied for a free webcam can learn more and apply online. Komlanc emphasizes that setting up the plug-and-play webcam is intended to be as easy and user-friendly as possible and requires relatively low bandwidth. Since the Professors to Schools announcement, Komlanc has received interested responses from Illinois faculty in a variety of disciplines, including chemistry, astronomy, genomics, art and design, mechanical science, computer science, aerospace engineering, and plant science. She welcomes new participants from science, technology, engineering, and math disciplines. Sessions will be scheduled according to school and classroom hours. "You never know what's going to spark and motivate a student to get on fire about a subject," Komlanc says. "My hope is that Illinois faculty will spark that fire in some of these students, or at least motivate them to start checking out their options in science, technology, engineering or math. Our ultimate goal is to inspire them to go into these areas for life." To find out more about the Professors to Schools program, contact Komlanc at nkomlanc@ncsa.uiuc.edu or visit its web site.