Join us on October 4th for a FREE screening of Chasing Coral and a talk back with our very own coral expert, Dr. Phil Dustan. Admission is free but seating is limited – register for your seat today at http://ssm.cofc.edu/events/

Those of us here in South Carolina are about to witness a unique and spectacular event – a total solar eclipse and Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston are in the path of totality! This total solar eclipse is the first in the continental United States in nearly 40 years and takes place on Aug. 21, 2017.

This celestial event is a solar eclipse in which the moon passes between the sun and Earth and blocks all or part of the sun for up to about three hours, from beginning to end, as viewed from a given location. For this eclipse, the longest period when the moon completely blocks the sun from any given location along the path will be about two minutes and 40 seconds. The last time the contiguous U.S. saw a total eclipse was in 1979.

There are numerous locations around the Charleston area where you can safely witness this event. Safety is of extreme importance! You never want to look directly at the sun without appropriate protection except during totality. That could severely hurt your eyes. There are many ways to safely view an eclipse of the sun including direct viewing – which requires some type of filtering device, like eclipse glasses (make sure they are ISO certified) and indirect viewing where you project an image of the sun onto a screen. For a cool projector that you can make, check out http://richardsont.people.cofc.edu/safe_solar_folder/index.html

For locations around the lowcountry, check out our map at: https://blogs.cofc.edu/lowcountryhall/great-american-eclipse-2017/

The 2017 Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair was held Tuesday, April 4, 2017 at the College of Charleston TD Arena. Over 120 students participated showing off their wonderful projects in science, engineering and math. Congratulations to all of our winners, this list of which can be accessed at http://lhsm.cofc.edu/lowcountry-science-fair/index.php.

Two Engineering students from Stall High School with their high altitude balloon payload.

The top winners this year included: From the Junior 1 Division (5th and 6th grade), Lindsey Fauerbach, from East Cooper Montessori School, took 1st place for her project, Enjoy the Ride about coding an mBot, a robotic car, to prove that self-driving cars are now realistic. From the Junior 2 Division (7th and 8th grade), Benjamin Lipschutz, from Addlestone Hebrew Academy, took first place for his project, Evaluation of the Five Second Rule and Beyond, to test food that is on the floor for less than and more than five seconds to assess if it becomes contaminated. From the Senior 1 Division (9th and 10th grade), Rachel Esienhart, from Palmetto Scholars Academy, took first place for her project, Brain Food: Multisensory Perception and Interference, an experiment to determine whether or not the McGurk effect could be applied to sight and taste. And from the Senior 2 Division (11th and 12th grades), Jenny Yao from academic Magnet High School, took first place for her project, Identifying Limiting Nutrient on Stem Cell Spheroid Viability for Human Cardiac Tissue Regeneration, which looked at Stem cell-derived cardiomyocyte spheroids as potential cell delivery systems that improve cell retention and engraftmen.

Overall Winners Jenny Yao and Ali DeLambo with teacher Katy Metzner-Roop

The overall winner of the Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair was Jenny Yao, who will travel to Los Angeles, CA to present her project at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. In addition, this year, the overall second place winner, Ali DeLambo will also travel there. Amazing Projects!

Thank you to all students, teachers, parents and judges that participated, encouraging STEM minds!

On Saturday, March 10, 2017, over 20 students from the Lowcountry came together to compete in the 2017 You Be the Chemist Charleston Challenge. 4 schools, Buist Academy, CE Williams Middle School, Gregg Middle School, and St. George Middle School sent students from grades 5th through 8th to show off their chemistry knowledge. After several exciting tiebreaker rounds, Buist Academy took the championship. Asher Wallen, a 7th grader, became our You Be the Chemist Charleston champion. Gar Fowler, an 8th grader from Buist Academy took second, and Ashton Pool, a 7th grader from Gregg Middle School took third. These three students, along with 5 others will move on to the state challenge.

Congratulations to all students!

The You Be the Chemist challenge was sponsored by the Chemical Educational Foundation, BASF, Brenntag and the College of Charleston Lowcountry Hall of Science and Math.

For more information on the You Be the Chemist Challenge, check out the CEF page at https://www.chemed.org/programs/challenge/.

Join the Lowcountry Hall of Science and Math on February 11, 2017 at the Charleston STEM Festival. During the festival kick-off, children and families will view exhibits and participate in interactive demonstrations hosted by local industries, non-profits and educational institutions. In the two weeks following the event, our community supporters will be hosting a wide variety of events around town, including workshops, lectures, and open houses.

The festival kick-off on Saturday, February 11, 2017 is a one-day (10am-3pm) interactive event at Brittlebank Park that will highlight the many STEM education initiatives in the area. This year the festival will be held in conjunction with the Math Meet (http://mathmeet.cofc.edu/), as well as the Storm the Citadel Trebuchet competition (https://sites.google.com/site/stormthecitadelcompetitions/).

For more information, check out http://charlestonstemfest.org/.

Where were you on February 26th, 1979? During 1979 Jimmy Carter was the 39th president of the United States, the Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Dallas Cowboys in Super Bowl 13 and McDonald’s introduced the Happy Meal. This was the most recent total solar eclipse the continental United States has experienced. Now, after a drought of nearly four decades, the United States will be treated to the Great American Eclipse. Total eclipses are rare and very impactful events. For those who have witnessed them, it is a memory they keep forever. Come see what its all about!

Join us this weekend to find out more about the eclipse as well as our sun and various other energy sources. We will even have a soccer ball that powers a lamp…how cool is that? The event is being held at the final soccer game of the Charleston Battery, on September 24 at 7:30PM. This event is presented by the College of Charleston School of Science and Mathematics, specifically the Department of Physics and Astronomy, the Lowcountry Hall of Science and Math, the SC NASA Space Grant Consortium, and the Charleston Battery Soccer team. Experience hands-on activities and demonstrations, as well as, see a high altitude balloon being launched the day of the eclipse, and then enjoy the soccer game against the New York Red Bulls.

What: High altidude balloon launch and video streaming, and hands on demonstrations of physics models, including an energy storing soccer ball
Where: MUSC Health Stadium
When: Saturday, September 24, 2016, 7:30PM

We hope to see you there!

Join us for the 5th annual STEM Education Day presented by the College of Charleston School of Science and Mathematics, Lowcountry Hall of Science and Math, and Lady Cougars Basketball team. Experience hands-on activities and demonstrations related to science, technology, engineering and math by College of Charleston Faculty as well as local STEM organizations and then enjoy the Lady Cougars basketball game against Hofstra University, out of New York.

What: STEM hands-on activities and demonstrations including (to name only a few) marine animal touch tanks, energy and light physics demos, earth and planetary science, sustainability in the classroom, robotics and computer science, flying paper airplane construction, dancing with Clyde the Cougar, and the list goes on!

Where: College of Charleston TD Arena
When: Friday, January 27, 2017
     STEM Activities: 9:30-11 AM
     Game: 11:30 AM – on
Who: The event is open to all 3rd-8th grade classes in the Lowcountry (however you MUST register as there is limited space). Register at https://blogs.cofc.edu/lowcountryhall/stemdayreg/ or you can send the application found in the registration flyer at 2017-cofc-stem-day-registration-packet to rodgersja@cofc.edu.
Cost: Free
Deadline: Register by Friday, January 13, 2017 to ensure your space

We hope to see you there!

Congratulations to the 2016 Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair Winner, Isabella Neubauer! Isabella researched whether online personality tests can accurately measure a person’s personality by testing if the results varied over time. Studies like Isabella’s are important because with an emphasis on social media and personality quizzes, we need to understand the science behind these influences. For example, there are online personality quizzes that employers could use to gauge what type of person you are to use in the hiring decision making process.

Isabella found that her participants’ personality test results changed after two weeks of their first quiz, indicating that these tests might not be an accurate representation of one’s personality. She deduced that, “…the results of online personality tests are not an accurate representation of people’s personalities, and while they may be fun, caution should be exercised for real world applications.”

While doing this research, Isabella took it a step further and investigated the link between music preferences and the “Big 5” personality types. Isabella concluded that there was not a strong connection; however she did find that, “country listeners tended to have low neuroticism and openness, Classical/Christian listeners were agreeable, conscientious, and not neurotic, and rock listeners were introverted.”

With this research, Isabella won the Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair, held in April at the College of Charleston and presented at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF), this May in Phoenix, AZ. Of her trip to the Intel ISEF, she said, “…being able to be a part of the competition at such a high level was awesome, but a little scary too. Interacting with the other competitors and learning about their projects was inspiring – learning from and sometimes just goofing off with some of the smartest kids in the world. Definitely a unique experience.” The LHSM was proud to have Isabella represent the Lowcountry of South Carolina at the Intel ISEF. Her trip was made possible through a donation by the Charleston Defense Contractors Association.

Isabella will be a Junior at The Georgetown School of Art and Sciences, Georgetown, SC. She is still not quite sure what the future holds for her, but she knows that she is interested in science, photography and editing, and history.

As the Intel ISEF says…the future is indeed bright for these science fair participants. And it is indeed bright for our own Isabella Neubauer.

The 2016 Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair was held Tuesday, April 5, 2016 at the College of Charleston TD Arena. Over 120 students participated showing off their wonderful projects in science, engineering and math. Congratulations to all of our winners, this list of which can be accessed at http://lhsm.cofc.edu/lowcountry-science-fair/index.php.

Student presenting his science fair project to one of our judges.

The top winners this year included: From the Junior 1 Division (5th and 6th grade), McAndrew Mangan and John Wohlsheid, from Fort Johnson Middle School, took 1st place for their real world problem solving, creating Kinesthetic Speed Bumps, providing the James Island County Park Festival of Lights an alternative source of energy to pwer their amazing light displays. From the Junior 2 Division (7th and 8th grade), Isabella Hehr, from the Lowcountry Leadership Charter School, took first place for her project, Electric Night Mares, in which she exposed mares to incandescent lighting to simulate increase in daylight so that their bodies would assume that it was Spring or Summer which is their normal breeding season, potentially bearing foals earlier in the season. From the Senior 1 Division (9th and 10th grade), Isabella Neubauer, from The Georgetown School of Arts an Sciences, took first place for her project, Music in my Mind, in which to determine if any connection exists between personality as measured by the Big 5 test and music preferences. And from the Senior 2 Division (11th and 12th grades), Emily Ingalls from academic Magnet High School, took first place for her project, Increasing the Efficacy of Corneal Cross-linking [CXL] to treat Keratoconic Eyes, a disease of the cornea.

Isabella Neubauer, overall winner of the Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair.

Isabella Neubauer, overall winner of the Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair.[/caption]The overall winner of the Lowcountry Regional Science and Engineering Fair was Isabella Neubauer, who will travel to Phoenix, AZ to present her project at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. Amazing Projects!

Thank you to all students, teachers, parents and judges that participated, encouraging STEM minds!

Join the Lowcountry Hall of Science and Math on February 6, 2016 at the Charleston STEM Festival. During the festival kick-off, children and families will view exhibits and participate in interactive demonstrations hosted by local industries, non-profits and educational institutions. In the two weeks following the event, our community supporters will be hosting a wide variety of events around town, including workshops, lectures, and open houses.

The festival kick-off on Saturday, February 6, 2016 is a one-day (10am-3pm) interactive event at Brittlebank Park that will highlight the many STEM education initiatives in the area.

For more information, check out http://charlestonstemfest.org/.