Lincoln Elementary School STEAM Night
As reported by Charlie Gluchowski:
The STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) outreach event on Thursday evening, November 16th at Lincoln Elementary School in Richmond was a great success. Bryan Balazs led the charge and warmed up the crowd of students and parents with several explosive, colorful and educational demonstrations. Then, participants spread out and learned about various hands-on activities presented by volunteers from Chevron and Las Positas College, among others. Michael Cheng organized the Chemistry Rainbow activity, based on Anthocyanins (from red cabbage but also present in various fruits and vegetables) as colorful pH indicators. Mariana Alves from Novartis and seven Las Positas College students did fabulous work interacting with both the students and parents while demonstrating the color changes with acids and bases – including the carbon dioxide in our breath! Of course, safety came first with the Cal ACS team, so participants put on their safety glasses before handling the reagents. The evening was capped off with Michael making a delicious batch of liquid nitrogen ice cream which we handed out to everyone who wanted it!