Winner Reports

Sarah won the Strontium Zone in June 2012, she tells us how she spent her winnings: I co-organised the residential, 1-week Astrobiology Summer Academy 2013, which brought together 10 students (15-18 years old) from schools in Shetland, 4 from Edinburgh, 1 from Leicester and two PhD students from NASA (USA) to experience university research in biology, astronomy and geology. I was responsible for the biology activity day. It kicked off with an introduction round where students picked objects from a table and discussed whether they were alive or dead, organic or inorganic (e.g. limestone, toothbrush, a flower, a lemon, ball of yarn etc), which was actually quite difficult! We then had a lecture by Lynn Rothshild, head of Synthetic Biology at NASA, before hitting the lab and the biology assault course that I devise to simulate interdisciplinary research. In 5 expert teams, the students analysed 12 mystery samples from Planet Earth and … Continue reading →

David won the Potassium Zone in March 2011, here he tells us how he spent his £500: When I won my zone of I’m A Scientist in March 2011, I had the intention of taking video cameras on volcano fieldwork, and to make either video- or podcasts of my work in the field. In early 2011, one of my field sites (Santorini volcano in Greece) was showing some early signs of unrest, so I invested in a simple video camera and three static ‘timelapse’ cameras. We managed to capture some footage of us putting out volcano monitoring equipment, but in the end the unrest died away in early 2012, without any eruption. I have some great timelapse footage of the passing seasons, but nothing that we have yet turned into a polished video. The other thing that the win did for me was to inspire my efforts in ‘online’  engagement … Continue reading →

Nicola won the Rubidium Zone in June 2012, here’s how she spent her winnings: Following my I’m A Scientist win last year, £250 was donated to Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) projects; more specifically it was spent on the STEMgirls project, a Q&A answer service connecting 11-18yr olds interested in STEM careers with the women working in those jobs. The money went towards providing the funds for an administrator to moderate and promote the site, enabling hundreds of career hunting teens to get the advice they needed about ‘real life’ day-to-day work in science. Getting advice from women working in my chosen scientific discipline was invaluable to me when I was trying to work out what I wanted to do for a career, so this project is quite close to my heart. The other £250 prize money was given to fellow I’m A Scientist participant Tiffany, who had written … Continue reading →

John won the Bromine Zone in June 2012, find out how he spent his winnings: With the £500 I decided to use this to participate in the first “I’m a Scientist Live” event at the Cardiff Science Festival on Sunday 15th July 2012.  The money was spent on flights, other travel, accommodation etc to go from St. Andrews to the Wales Millennium Centre.  This was my first science festival and I was very nervous but excited to go on stage and go into combat with other scientists! There were 5 other scientists participating, where after going through several rounds of questions 4 of us would be voted off.  We came down from a “green room” to find an audience of about 200 (perhaps I’m exaggerating, but it felt like that!). We each had two minutes to introduce our work and ourselves. We had been asked to bring two facts about their … Continue reading →

Evan won the Iron Zone in June 2011, here he tells us how he spent his winnings: I have donated my prize money to 3 very important organisations. The first is TASTE (The African Science Truck Experience). This is a UK-based charity which works in Uganda to bring science to high school students. In Uganda science achievement in schools is very low, something which is strongly influenced by a lack of funding to buy any lab equipment! It is very difficult to learn science ‘by rote’ rather doing the experiments yourself. It is this ‘getting your hands dirty’ that really creates understanding. TASTE aims to change the situation by bringing lab equipment from school to school, in a truck, for students to use, as well as providing training for local teachers. It is an excellent project and that is why I donated £300 of my prize money to it. Amazingly, this small sum covers the cost of regular experiments for 30 … Continue reading →

Alison won I’m a Scientist, In the Zone in July 2012. Here she tells us how she spent her winnings: The I’m a Scientist, In the Zone event was such an incredible experience.  I had such a wonderful time interacting with students and their teachers through the live web chats and the forum Q&As – I think I learned nearly as much as they did during the process.  I tell all the scientists I know that they should sign up to take part! I was really honoured to be selected the winner of the 7-11 zone and I want to thank all of the students who voted for me.  THANK YOU! I really wanted to do something with my prize money that would reach as many people as I possibly could – and so this meant setting up a website.  It can be accessed by all the students in all the … Continue reading →

Drew won the Calcium Zone in June 2011, here’s how he spent his prize money… When I competed in “I’m a Scientist Get Me Out of Here”, I rashly promised that I would produce an website game allowing students to play around with different designs and investigate whether they increased or decreased risk. My own research moved in a direction which made this difficult-to-impossible to do, so I’m guilty of bait-and-switch. Here’s what I did with the money instead: DisasterCast is a podcast about Scary Things. The first episodes came out in January 2013. Each episode is 30 minutes long, and follows the formula: 1) Something old – a discussion about a famous disaster and what we can learn from it. Early episodes include: the Hindenburg Disaster, Challenger, Coal Mine Disasters, Bhopal, and the world’s biggest ever industrial accident (you’ll have to listen to the podcast to find out more). … Continue reading →

Ceri won the Evolution Zone in June 2010, here’s how she spent her winnings: I had great fun taking part in I’m a Scientist back in 2010 and I can still remember some of the questions I was asked.  My favourite was whether the characters in Twilight could actually exist from an evolutionary perspective.  I didn’t think I was going to have to declare my allegiance to Team Edward or Team Jacob during my web chats! I was thrilled to be voted the winner and want to say thank you again, not only to everyone who voted for me, but to everyone who thought of probing questions too. I have done (and am still doing) a number of things with my £500 prize money.  When I finished my Ph.D. I was wondering for a long time on how best to use the money and how to get the most good … Continue reading →

Robin won the I’m an Engineer Energy Zone in March 2012. His plan all along was to donate it to the CCFE Charitable Fund which is “used to support science and other projects with local schools, and to support local community groups with grants for particular pieces of equipment. So far this has included both primary and secondary schools with a strong emphasis on the science teaching and support.” Here’s how the the donation was used… We presented the cheque for the prizemonies to the school, St Gregory The Great in Oxford. The money is being spent on a Microwave transmitter and receiver as shown in the picture foreground. This will be very useful for the year 12 and year 13 Physics and science programs. Various aspects of wave and wave transmission and interference can be demonstrated and researched.

In March last year, I was delighted to win the Space Zone of I’m A Scientist, Get Me Out of Here. The prize was £500 to spend on an engagement project. I’ve had a plan for a long term project with a school for a while. It would involve designing space missions to give kids an idea of what the engineering process is really like. The prize money gave me a chance to put my plan into action. The first step was to hold a “Rocket day” at the Radcliffe School in Wolverton. The prize money helped to buy materials, including a bottle rocket kit, and prizes for the end of the day. During the day, the kids went into teams to design a mission to Mars. We went through the process of creating a specification, thinking about what such a mission would need. After a very enjoyable day at … Continue reading →

TASTE for Science is a charity that gives students in rural Uganda the chance to do science experiments in lessons. It’s transforming science education in Uganda by letting students actually do science experiments, not just learn about them. A mobile science lab visits schools while also holding training camps for science teachers, demonstrating practicals to run in lessons. Jim, an I’m a Scientist winner explains a lot more about them in his post about why he donated his money to TASTE. TASTE was only dreamed up in 2011 and the first mobile lab is venturing out around now, at the start of 2013. It’s a lovely innovative project that will really benefit students. Which is why it’s great that a number of I’m a Scientist winners have donated their winnings, or part of them, to TASTE. Here’s a list which we’ll update if more donations are made. Jim Caryl  – he’s … Continue reading →

I was lucky enough to win the Earth Science Zone in June 2012. I loved taking part in ‘I’m a Scientist’, my favorite part was reading the range of questions asked by the students and trying to answer them! After much deliberation I decided to use the £500 winnings to try and teach school children all about Antarctica. I had some great helpers in the form of Dr Alessandro Tagliabue, Dr Jonathan Lauderdale and two fellow PhD students Nicholas‎ Rogan and Matthew Donnelly who all work with me at the University of Liverpool. Together we designed an interactive educational project that could be taken out to any school interested in learning about Antarctica. The aim was to try and teach the children some stuff, but also allow them to have some fun! We each designed individual sections, I spoke about the exploration of Antarctica and brought along some polar clothing … Continue reading →