Community Outreach

Throughout this year we have kept in contact with old community partners and

have started to foster new relationships with another local school district. The

SC had the pleasure of going into Dublin High School’s Biomedical Academy

to help our department head present a lecture on lipid metabolism, which

concluded with a case study and a discussion of what it's like to be a science

major in college. We also have been in contact with Westerville City Schools

to develop a event or set of events to get involved with their biomedical

students.

Starry Night

Otterbein UAN participated in Starry Night, which is a

community interest festival that promotes K-12 STEM

learning. The theme for last years festival was motion.

We incorporated that by showing models of Actin and

Myosin, discussing what proteins are and where they are

found, and then having the kids make pipe cleaner

models of the proteins. Over 1,500 people show up to the

event every year. The theme for this year is Nature and

there will be a few groups from our organization

presenting hands-on demonstrations.

Student Chapter Outreach and Community at Otterbein UniversityPatrick Cole, Ashley Fox, Hannah Bailey, Brittany Barta, Emma Reed, John T Tansey

Otterbein University, Westerville, OH 43081

ABSTRACT

This past year Otterbein University’s ASBMB Chapter has expanded its

outreach methods and has expanded on the relationships that help promote

STEM learning within the Westerville community. Our chapter has

participated in a community STEM interest festival. This festival is called

Starry night and we act as exhibitors in the festival. Starry Night promotes

interdisciplinary learning in fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, Art,

and Mathematics (STEAM). Over 1500 visitors attended the festival, where

the UAN explained what proteins were and demonstrated protein folding

using pipe cleaners as models. The organizers of this festival (Westerville

Partners for Education) asked us to continue working with them through a

series of STEAM hubs, workshops to partner area teachers with experts in the

community in hopes of fostering collaborations and volunteer experiences.

We have attended three of these meetings and have talked with over forty

teachers about outreach opportunities. We have been able through these

STEAM hubs to create and run a science club for 3rd-5th grade students that

meets once a month at the local elementary school. This club so far has been

very successful. We have received a lot of positive feedback from both

parents and students. We plan to continue to foster this relationship as we

help their students gain more interest in different fields of science through

hands on experience. We also have partnered with an accelerated biomedical

science class at an area high school. One of our faculty members and several

UAN members spoke at the school about lipids and careers in science. We

plan to continue this relationship in the future, and be able to develop more

mentorship opportunities for them. For our own university community, we

participated in Otterthon, a dance marathon to raise money for the Children's

Miracle Network, which we have been involved with raising funds for the

past few years. The Student Chapter has also continued to help facilitate a

Woman in Science group. This synergistic group to the student chapter is

open to all science majors and has hosted several events. Finally, our student

chapter stays connected through a weekly tea and coffee hour (the BMBT)

and Facebook group. These venues allow us to share news and ideas,

including professional development and scholarship opportunities.

Hanby Elementary Science and Nature Club

Our main outreach focus of this year was the takeover and running of the

Hanby Science and Nature Club. This club had approximately 20 students

once a month for the past academic year. Each month we would plan and

implement 90 minute program for the students. The basic design was usually

three to four hands-on, immersive science experiments that taught the students

basic science concepts, with the last event usually being a engineering

challenge that would introduce the students to teamwork and scientific

thought through designing ideas and implementing them in a given time. One

of the main goals of this club was to give the participants a better

understanding and appreciation of science. In doing that we were able to give

the children a good place to ask questions about science topics that they were

interested in and it allowed us the opportunity to learn more about topics that

we did not have as much prior knowledge about. It was also a great way for

both us and the kids to learn about teamwork. Many of the experiments that

we did had the kids competing to do a task. This taught them to communicate

there ideas better and how to work with other students. We also learned many

teamwork skills in the planning and operation of the club. These skills will be

important later when we go on to other STEM Fields.

Acknowledgements

● Dr. John Tansey

● ASBMB Outreach Grant

● Hanby Elementary

● Dublin Scioto High School

● Westerville City Schools

● Westerville Partners in Science

Groups

Each week our UAN holds a weekly tea and coffee hour. This is a time for us to communicate about future events, enjoying eating

cookies and to discuss current topics in science. Our weekly tea hour sees about 20 students and faculty each week. We also stay in

touch through out the week through our UAN Facebook page.

Women in Science is a club that was founded by our UAN and now we help facilitate their club to help promote women in STEM

fields. Also, a large number of BMB students are look forward to graduate and pre-professional schools. Our SC has created study

groups for the MCAT and GRE to help our peers in achieving their goals.