Event News

Moderator Vacancies June 2014

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here, is an award-winning event where school students (age 9–18) interact with real scientists online. We’re looking for 5 moderators to work on the next event which will run 16th–27th June 2014. At the same time we’ll also be running I’m an Engineer, and for the very first time, I’m a Geoscientist which will also need moderating. Your key responsibilities will be: Checking and approving questions. Adding appropriate keywords and tags. Logging and keeping track of questions, comments and dialogue. Checking the site for errors, and inappropriate content and usernames. Moderating live chats. Helping to run the site. It’s a lot of fun as the students (and scientists) are quick and funny and full of energy. And hey, promoting science engagement is a good thing, am I right?! What we’d like from you.. You should be bright, thoughtful, pick stuff up easily, ideally … Continue reading →

Posted on April 30, 2014 by modjosh in Event News, News | Comments Off

March 2014 Moderator Job Vacancies

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an award-winning online event allowing students (from 9 – 18) to interact with real live scientists. We’re looking for 3 moderators to work on the next event which will run from the 10th March to the 21st March 2014. We will also be running a zone in I’m an Engineer at the same time, which will also need moderating. Your key responsibilities will be: checking and approving questions adding appropriate keywords and tags logging and keeping track of questions, comments and dialogue checking the site for errors and inappropriate content and usernames moderating live chats helping to run the site It’s actually a lot of fun as the students (and scientists) are quick and funny and full of energy. And hey, promoting science engagement is a good thing, am I right?! What we’d like from you.. You should be bright, thoughtful, … Continue reading →

Posted on February 6, 2014 by modemily in Event News, IAS Event, Science Engagement | Comments Off

I’m a Scientist acts as a public engagement booster for scientists

Anecdotally, we’ve heard of how I’m a Scientist can be a good starting point for science communication activities. This was the case of Suzi Gage, Tom Crick or Suze Kundu, who took part in I’m a Scientist in June 2011 and are now putting a great emphasis on the communication side of their scientific careers or even fully devoting to it. However, we were still curious to know to what extent we could extrapolate this to the wider community of scientists that have participated in the event during the last years. How could we know if I’m a Scientist had encouraged them to do more science outreach? Well, we decided to ask them. We sent a survey to all the scientists that had participated in I’m a Scientist until 2012, leaving a gap of at least one year since they took part in the event. Approximately a quarter of the … Continue reading →

Posted on January 8, 2014 by modangela in Evaluation, Event News, News, Science Engagement, Scientist Benefits, Scientists | Comments Off

How does I’m a Scientist change students’ perceptions of science?

We’ve just run I’m a Scientist in Ireland and are curious to know how our event actually affects students’ attitudes towards science. In order to do this, we included a short and compulsory pre-event survey in the form students used to register. We then asked students to fill in the exact same survey on their profile page after the event. When we matched the data from the two surveys, 92 students (7% of 1,247 students that participated in I’m a Scientist) had filled in both surveys. Importantly, data from the total number of students that filled in the pre-event survey very closely correlates with the pre-event data of this 92 student sample. We were very happy to find out that students’ interest in science and science related careers is clearly increased after taking part in I’m a Scientist. This is what we have learnt: The amount of students that say they love science doubled after taking part in … Continue reading →

Posted on December 19, 2013 by modangela in Evaluation, Event News, IAS Event, News, Science Education, Science Engagement, Teachers | Comments Off

June 2013 Moderator Job Vacancies

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an award-winning online event allowing teenagers to interact with real live scientists. We’re looking for 6 moderators to work on the next event which will run from the 17th to the 28th of June 2013. We will also be running 2 zones in I’m an Engineer at the same time, which will also need moderating. Your key responsibilities will be will be: hosting/moderating live chats approving questions looking after your zones logging and keeping track of great questions, comments and dialogue checking the site for errors and inappropriate content helping to run the site It’s actually a lot of fun as the students (and scientists) are quick and funny and full of energy. And hey, promoting science engagement is a good thing. What we’d like from you.. You should be bright, thoughtful, pick stuff up easily, ideally with an interest in … Continue reading →

Posted on May 13, 2013 by in Event News, IAS Event, Science Engagement | Comments Off

Take part in June 2013!

In just 10 weeks time we’ll have started our next ‘I’m a Scientist’ event. From Monday June 17th to Friday June 28th we’ll be in the midst of yet more wonderful science engagement and outreach. We’ve got 18 zones confirmed so far. Zones Human Limits – funded by The Physiological Society Cells – funded by the British Society for Cell Biology Energy – funded by the Royal Society of Chemistry 3 zones just for STFC researchers. Preliminary suggestions are: Crystallography New Materials Extreme Speed 2 zones funded by the Institute of Physics for Stimulating Physics Network schools Earth Quantum 5 general zones funded by the Wellcome Trust – from Silver to Antimony 5 biomed themed zones funded by the Wellcome Trust UPDATE Proposed Biomed zones are: Animal Behaviour Blood Disease Hormones Reproduction Take Part Scientists wanting to take part should apply by Monday 6th May 2013 at https://imascientist.org.uk/scientist-apply (see the email, to update … Continue reading →

Posted on April 17, 2013 by in Event News, Project News | Comments Off

March 2013 Moderator Job Vacancies

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an award-winning online event allowing teenagers to interact with real live scientists. We’re looking for 4 moderators to work on the next event which will run from the 11th to the 22nd of March 2013. We will also be running a zone in I’m an Engineer at the same time, which will also need moderating. Your key responsibilities will be will be: hosting/moderating live chats approving questions checking the site for errors and inappropriate content helping to run the site It’s actually a lot of fun as the students (and scientists) are quick and funny and full of energy. And hey, promoting science engagement is a good thing. What we’d like from you.. You should be bright, pick stuff up easily, ideally with an interest in science engagement. You’ll have great attention to detail and will enjoy being online, perhaps have … Continue reading →

Posted on February 11, 2013 by in Event News, IAS Event, Science Engagement | Comments Off

IAS Outreach by STEMNet Area

We’ve selected the scientists and schools (all will be revealed next week) and we’ve looked at where they are across the country. We want to work closely with STEMNet contract holders to promote our events to teachers, scientists and engineers, so we’ve calculated how many schools, classes and scientists are in each STEMNet contract area. From that we’ve calculated the estimated number of interactions (or Live Chats as we call them) we expect per area. On average each class has one live chat and each scientist attends seven. The best news was that there are only 3 areas where there is no activity. We are doing science engagement and enrichment across the country. But where do we have most activity? Most classes signed up: Bristol, Bath and Somerset – 25 Lancashire – 19 Surrey, Central and East Berkshire & West Yorkshire – 18 Special Kudos to Liz Lister in Bristol, … Continue reading →

Posted on February 7, 2013 by in Evaluation, Event News | Comments Off

We’re oversubscribed with teachers wanting to take part in March

We run I’m a Scientist 3 times each year – March, June & November. The March events are always busy and popular with teachers. It coincides with National Science & Engineering Week and the timing fits in well with schemes of work. Thanks to more funding we’ve added 2 more themed zones – a Digital Zone and a Food Science Zone (more on these later this week in another post). Despite these zones creating 50 extra class places we weren’t prepared for just how oversubscribed we would be this time round. 11 zones with 25 classes in each zone gives 275 class spaces up for grabs. 142 teachers asked for 374 classes between them. Making the event oversubscribed by 36%. So, how have we allocated classes? Give as many teachers as possible places, ie give fewer classes to more teachers Cap the number of classes per teacher at 5 Try … Continue reading →

Posted on January 23, 2013 by in Event News, IAS Event, News, Science Engagement | Comments Off

What’s the BEST I’m a Scientist question?

We’ve been wondering what’s the best question in I’m a Scientist, and we’d like you to help us choose. So we’re running a competition. There are so many amazing questions in I’m a Scientist, from ‘Would You Lick Jam Off An Old Man’s Foot Or Drink Toliet Water For An Hour And Why?‘ to ‘If gravitons travel at the speed of light, and the escape velocity of a black hole is greater than the speed of light, how is it that the gravitons can escape from the black hole?‘. And a question which often perplexes me, ‘Why are people annoying?‘ Some of them are clever, and insightful. Some of them are deceptively simple, but pose questions most scientists have stopped asking themselves. Some are just hilariously funny. Sometimes, a seemingly simple question gets an unexpectedly interesting answer. A student in March’s Forensics Zone asked, ‘What’s your ringtone?‘. Mark Hill, who … Continue reading →

Posted on August 8, 2011 by in Event News, News | Comments Off

Who’s taking part in June?

We have now chosen the scientists and schools for I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! in June. Zones This June is our biggest ever event, with 23 ‘zones’. 12 are general and named after elements, containing a broad range of scientists and research areas. 11 are themed zones, with themes from Microbiology to Energy Generation, Ecology and Marine and Underwater Science. Due to popular demand we are repeating some themed zones from previous years – Sports Science, Genes, Brain, Forensic Science and Evolution. We’re particularly excited about the Healthy Ageing zone sponsored by RCUK’s Lifelong Health and Wellbeing programme, and the Quantum zone which is sponsored by the Institute of Physics. Schools There’s a big variety in the schools taking part, with students involved from Singapore and Hungary to the Isle of Skye. We hope that, as in previous years, classes at these schools are going to have a great experience taking part. … Continue reading →

Posted on June 3, 2011 by in Event News, News | Comments Off

Announcement: Zones for June

The next I’m a Scientist event, in June, will be the biggest ever. Wondering what zones we’ll have? Well wonder no more! Themed zones Sports Science Zone Quantum Zone (sponsored by the Institute of Physics) Microbiology Zone Marine and Underwater Science Zone Healthy Ageing Zone (sponsored by Research Councils UK) Genes Zone Forensic Science Zone Evolution Zone Energy Generation Zone Ecology Zone Brain Zone General Zones Phosphorous Sulphur Calcium Scandium Titanium Vanadium Chromium Manganese Iron Cobalt Nickel Copper Themed zones will have scientists who all work on something related to the topic of the zone. The topics were mainly chosen by teachers, because we believe in listening to our participants as much as possible. General zones will have a mix of scientists, from all different areas of science. We’re particularly excited about our two sponsored zones – Quantum Zone (all about very very small things), sponsored by the Institute of … Continue reading →

Posted on May 5, 2011 by in Event News, News | Comments Off

Congratulations to the March event student winners!

We would like to congratulate the following winning students from the March 2011 event. The moderators thought they all asked good questions and really engaged with the event. The students winners of I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! are: Name School Zone Andrew Wood Tiffin School Argon Benjamin Case Mangotsfield Secondary School Chlorine Erin Ibbetson Broadoak Mathematics & Computing College Forensic Science Samuel Porter The Kings School, Devon Potassium Ahmad Dehghani West Thames College Space Calvin Mallion Chafford Hundred Campus Stem Cell Research Well done to all the students above! They have now received their student winners certificates and WHSmith vouchers. We would also like to thank all the other students who participated. Everyone contributed to the brilliant chats and thought provoking questions, which made this year’s I’m a Scientist, Get me out of Here! one of the most exciting and fun events yet.

Posted on April 7, 2011 by in Event News, News, School | Comments Off

I’m a Scientist – latest news

You’ve all been asking questions like crazy and having lots of live chats with our lovely scientists. The website has been about 50% busier than at the same time last year! We were worried that you’d be wearing out the scientists, but they seem to be loving it. One said they are now addicted to live chats. And another says he’s learning new skills – like the ability to write answers to questions really really fast. We hope you are having fun. Remember, you’ve got until Friday 25th March to ASK questions CHAT to scientists And, most importantly, VOTE for who you think should get £500! Don’t forget to ‘like’ scientists’ answers if you think they are good – otherwise how will they know what sort of answers you want? Remember, this is the event where YOU are in charge.

Posted on March 16, 2011 by in Event News | Comments Off

Day One Gremlins

We prepare a lot for I’m a Scientist. We check our lists, we cross off tasks, we write new lists of things to check. The one thing we can’t really do is test how the site will operate under stress. It really helps to have a couple of hundred students trying to access the live chats for that. This morning you obliged and we found something was lacking. A piece of technical wizardry called MemcacheD wasn’t running. MemcacheD basically stores the most used parts of the database in memory and it means less work for the database. Without it the database gets overloaded. This morning with three live chats all at the same time it got overloaded and eventually the server stopped working. The good news is we got MemcacheD started again just before we needed to reboot the server. Since then the site has been used very heavily again … Continue reading →

Posted on March 14, 2011 by in Event News | Comments Off

Who said scientists aren’t funny?

In I’m a Scientist we ask all the scientists to tell us a joke. It turns out everyone loves this bit of the scientist’s profiles, so we thought we would gather them all here together, for your delight and delectation… Zone Scientist Joke Beryllium Philip Wadler There are two kinds of people—those who think there are two kinds of people, and those who don’t. Ian Sillett Why did the scarecrow win a nobel prize? He was outstanding in his field! (Topical?) Derek Mann Q. What did the fish say when he swam into the wall? A. Dam! Daniel Mietchen Schrödinger’s cat walks into a bar … and doesn’t. Boron Vicki Stevenson how many physicists does it take to change a light bulb? 2 – 1 to hold the bulb and 1 to rotate the universe Keith Brain 3 people travelling in a bus through the Australian countryside see a black … Continue reading →

Posted on July 23, 2010 by in Event News | Comments Off

Students! Tell us what you thought about I’m a Scientist, and win a prize.

This is a last reminder: We really want to hear from you! What do you think, did you like I’m a Scientist? What did you like/dislike about it? Was it better or worse than normal lessons? You should fill in our survey and tell us what you think. It helps us make it better for next time. Also you’ll go into a prize draw for £20 WH Smiths vouchers. Survey is here http://www.surveygizmo.com/s/307117/i-m-a-scientist-june-2010-tell-us-what-you-think- Thanks for your help!

Posted on July 19, 2010 by in Evaluation, Event News | Comments Off

A scientist gives us the lowdown on what it’s like behind the scenes…

As you all know, there are evictions every day for the rest of the week! You get a vote every day, so remember to keep voting for your favourite scientist. But how do the scientists feel, being bombarded with questions and then facing eviction? One of the scientists who took part in I’m a Scientist in March, the lovely Louise Buckley, has agreed to tell us about what the scientists taking part are REALLY thinking… Hey there! I am Louise one of the scientists from the last “I’m a Scientist….” event. This competition is looking even more exciting than when I took part – I cannot believe how many questions are getting asked. It’s a total mash-up of questions – these scientists are going to need to take a holiday afterwards to recover! I bet the scientists are starting to feel nervous now about who’s going to get evicted. We … Continue reading →

Posted on June 23, 2010 by in Evaluation, Event News | Comments Off

FIFA delays kick off for IAS breaking eviction news

Well no, OK, funnily enough FIFA aren’t changing their match times because of I’m a Scientist evictions. But we do have an eviction planned for 3.30pm on Wed, during the England vs Slovenia game. Because we are kind, caring people here at I’m a Scientist, we have decided to bring the time of Wednesday’s eviction forwards to 3pm. This means that you (and the moderators, who’ve been working very hard, and deserve a break) can relax and watch the match, with your eviction worries behind you. Apologies to those of you not supporting England, but we would move evictions for Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland matches too. If there were any. Also apologies to those of you who don’t like football. Me either. I and the two non-English mods will be looking after the site on our own while the match is on. Please try not to break anything. Other … Continue reading →

Posted on June 22, 2010 by in Event News | Comments Off

So what do the scientists plan to do if they win?

As you all know, the winner of I’m a Scientist gets a £500 grant to spend on science communication. And you students decide who gets it! So we thought we’d have a little look at some of their plans for the money. Here’s a few of the more interesting ones:- Beryllium Treasure Hunt Daniel Mietchen, from Beryllium Zone, is planning to share a bit of it (£50!) with the first student to work out his scientific puzzle. This is open to all students, not just in Beryllium Zone, so get your thinking caps on if you think you’d make a good scientific detective! Scan your Teacher Tom Hartley, in Imaging Zone, would use the money to scan one class’s teacher’s brain. While the teacher does a task chosen by the class. No, rude things not allowed I’m afraid. But you might be able to see inside your teacher’s head! The … Continue reading →

Posted on June 21, 2010 by in Event News | Comments Off

What can you do?

I want to take part with my class ❯

I want to take part as a scientist ❯

I want to find out about funding I’m a Scientist ❯

What is I’m a Scientist?

I’m a Scientist, Get me out of here is an online activity where school students get to meet and interact with scientists.

It’s a competition between scientists, where the students are the judges.

Students challenge the scientists over intense, fast-paced, online live Chats. Then they Ask the scientists all the questions they want to, and Vote for their favourite scientist to win a prize of £500 to communicate their work with the public.