 "Photo: Sarah Kim")
The School of Ocean and Earth Science Technology (SOEST) is one of the youngest schools at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, having been established by the Board of Regents in 1988. SOEST gets funding from the state and public institutions adding up to approximately $70 million per year for research, and a biennial open house was held last Friday and Saturday to give back to the public and showcase what these funds are being used for.
Oceanography, geology and geophysics, meteorology, and ocean and resources engineering are the four departments that fall under SOEST. At the 10th biennial open house, these four departments and other related institutes highlighted research being conducted by students, faculty and staff through videos, posters and interactive demonstrations.
“We want to show the state and public what we do and educate people about science in general,” said Leona M. Anthony, the director of student services at SOEST and an adviser for the event.
Anthony said that there are a lot of hands-on experience events that mainly deal with current events and what’s happening in the world today, like tsunami season and global warming.
At this year’s open house, there were 4,000 registered K-12 students on Friday, and an estimated 2,000 members of the general public who attended on Saturday to enjoy the exhibits and demonstrations.
Stella Lee, a seventh-grader at Sacred Hearts Academy, was one of the students in attendance on Friday for extra credit for her science class. She also brought along a friend, Clarissa Heart, a sixth-grader at Punahou School, who came along because “it sounded really fun and interesting.” Both agreed that the hands-on activities were exciting and educating, because seeing and doing science is more interesting than just reading about it and hearing it from a teacher in class. They both said that they would be back in two years for the next open house.
Exhibits at the open house catered to the various age groups in attendance. There were simple activities like fossil rubbing that involved children identifying prints of species of plants and fish, and then placing a sheet of paper over the print and rubbing a crayon across the sheet to reveal a picture to take home as a keepsake.
Other events required more understanding about science. The Make-a-Quake center involved children using a hammer to hit the ground, which was wired to measure the impact on a model of the Pacific region. Kids took home their readings from a seismograph, which measured the size of the earthquake they created.
There was also an event called “explosive eruptions,” which after a brief explanation of how liquid nitrogen can fuel an explosion in less than a second, a demonstration of 20 gallons of water erupting at ten meters high was performed.
Others who didn’t care for hands-on experience or who were just there to be educated could find exhibits on the current status of and importance of groundwater contamination to Hawai‘i, posters and talks about the usage and planning of biomass for energy in Hawai‘i, or tours around the National Weather Service.
Anthony explained that the SOEST open house is a big event that requires “a lot of planning and coordination involved.” Tara Hicks Johnson, the outreach specialist at SOEST, estimated there were around 400 volunteers, who were comprised of SOEST students, faculty and staff, and University of Hawaii at Manoa clubs and organizations.
“I think it’s kind of nice that the University of Hawai‘i can put on an event like this where we can show the little kids what UH is about,” said Kira Kaneshiro, a volunteer at the tattoo parlor and a member of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars.
“Hawai’i is a great place to learn about science and about the ocean and earth because of our weather and environment,” Anthony said.
But during these times of economic hardship, “free ones like these,” Johnson said, “are the events you want to take advantage of.”
Be the first to comment on this article!