Our Past Events
Electromagnetism Lab
One of the members orchestrated and presented a lesson plan activity to 4th and 5th grade students introducing them to an electromagnet. Each team created their own using a nail, wire, and batteries, and then used the magnet to try to pick up paperclips.
Fall Rally
A STEM related activity involving middle and high school students made balloon propelled cars and racing them.
Floyd County High School Outreach
We organized a Lego Cargo Drop activity, which included building a landing pad out of miscellaneous materials, which would catch and protect a Lego structure from breaking from increasing heights. We also designed an activity that taught basic kinematics principles and introduced students to plotting in MATlab.
Girl Scout Robotics
Groups of around ten girl scouts were able to assemble and code using Lego Mindstorms.The goal of the coding was to complete an obstacle course pre-built before the girl scouts arrived.
Marshmallow Towers
We gave a short presentation on how to make structures really tall (triangles, wide bases, etc.). Then, the students worked in groups to make the tallest structure out of marshmallows (2 cups) and toothpicks (250).
Meet the Scientist – Women’s Panel
The Virginia Science Festival asked Hypatia students to be presenters for their Meet the Scientist events. We prepared a panel of women engineers from Hypatia to talk to middle and high school students about their journies as college female engineer students.
Mini Maker Faire @ Barnes & Noble
We assisted with the Make & Collaborate sessions, where the kids were able to play with cool gadgets and technology, such as, a 3D printing machine, Spin Master Robots, Legos, bionicles, electrical circuits, and Drones.
October Sky
The event involved travelling to Beckley to help build rockets for an event celebrating Homer Hickam and the Rocket Boys.
Rube Goldberg Activity
One of the members orchestrated and presented a lesson plan activity to 8th grade students introducing them to energy transformations and Rube Goldberg Machines. There were weekly guest speakers who talked about different scientific processes that played into the machines.
STEM on Wheels
The purpose of this event is to bring STEM activities to schools that may not have access to the resources we can bring to them. By making the program applicable to SOLs, we make the program more appealing to teachers, and also ensure that students gain something valuable from each lesson.
The Virginia Science Festival
Galipatia ran two engineering-related events: Marshmallow Towers and Lego Drop. Marshmallow Towers was intended to get children to think critically about structural stability and what shapes are the strongest for construction purposes. This was more geared towards a civil engineering perspective, but also includes all disciplines because of its emphasis on building and learning.
Christiansburg Elementary School Visit
At Christiansburg Elementary School, we did a floating ping pong ball activity with 3 groups of students (40 - 50 each group).
Diffusion Lab
One of the members orchestrated and presented a lesson activity to 6th and 7th grade students introducing them to the basics of permeability and showing them the chemical reaction between cornstarch and iodine.