Science superheroes

Dal students Logan MacDowell and Brooke Boutilier are part of SuperNOVA, a student group that offers science workshops and camps to thousands of children (Danny Abriel photo)

A spirited energy pervades the Grade 5 classroom as students clamor to construct elaborate roller-coaster-like structures using chunks of foam tubing, paper cups, lengths of cord, a pulley and a few wooden wedges. The creations balance precariously, some stretching from tabletop to chair to floor – and occasionally back up again.

“We need more tape,” one student declares, urgently.

To the rescue is Heather Davidson, a biology student and instructor with SuperNOVA – the Dalhousie-based science outreach program that brings such excitement into classrooms. Ms. Davidson and her fellow instructor, psychology student Ben Parker, are at this local elementary school to share their love of science during a 90-minute workshop on simple machines and forces. It’s aligned with the class’s curriculum outcomes, so the teacher is happy, and the kids couldn’t be more excited.  

This is one of more than 200 classrooms that 13 SuperNOVA instructors – all undergraduate students -- will visit before the end of June. Back in their office on Sexton campus, SuperNOVA’s ‘Kid Counter’ – recording how many youngsters they reach – already stands at 6,756. That number will climb as instructors travel throughout Nova Scotia and into New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and northern Labrador. By year’s end, they’ll have extended their educational and entertaining science activities to close to 10,000 children.

“We believe in ‘science-for-all,’” says SuperNOVA Co-Director Ali Hutchings, a Dal biology grad. “We try to make that true by bringing science to the community, or by making it possible for kids to come to our camps.”

And come they do. Last year, more than 450 youngsters – Grades 1 to 12 – converged on the Dal campus for SuperNOVA’s July and August camps, week-long events focusing on everything from monomers to movie-making.

But much work goes into taking science off-campus, often to communities with minimal access to such hands-on learning. Co-Director Mara Fontana, a biology and neuroscience student, is planning SuperNOVA’s outreach program to northern Labrador in August. Last year, as a SuperNOVA instructor, she traveled to isolated Ontario communities on the shores of Hudson Bay.

“The kids are excited to see us,” she says. “These are really remote communities and many have no science teacher for junior high. So, we fly in and give them workshops that match their school curriculum outcomes. It’s a great feeling to know that you really reached somebody and that they enjoyed what you taught them.  One evening – after camp – a little girl and her friends knocked on the door of the house where I was staying and said, ‘Can we do some science with you?’ So you really feel like you’re having an impact on somebody.”

Summer outreach also takes place closer to home – SuperNOVA is conducting a week-long camp in Uniacke Square for the first time this year. They’ll travel to Eskasoni, Cape Breton, and Lennox Island, PEI, bringing camps to aboriginal communities. They’ll host camps for Boys and Girls Clubs in Sackville and Dartmouth. And they offer an all-girls summer camp and a year-round girls’ club.

“Our underlying philosophy is to instill a curiosity about science, engineering and technology,” Ms. Fontana says. “We want to nurture a love of science by breaking through the ‘I can’t do it!’ way of thinking, especially among under-represented groups.” 

Now in its 14th year, SuperNOVA continues to grow. According to Ms. Hutchings, that’s due in part to tremendous financial support through Actua membership and from other local and national groups, including Dalhousie.

Back in the Grade 5 classroom, students are testing their roller-coaster creations, breaking into yelps of excitement when a marble, dropped onto the track, follows its intended path through the twisty-turny contraptions. “It worked!” one student exclaims, before shooting a big grin to the instructors. 

“It really does make you feel special,” says Ms. Hutchings of the connection SuperNOVA instructors develop with children. “The kids can be fantastic; awesome. They remember our names. You sometimes feel like a superhero to them,” she laughs.