UC Davis presents its undergraduates in a scholarly conference this weekend, while also making room for college students from all across California, plus grade school and high school students for other conferences.
The 22nd Undergraduate Research Scholarship and Creative Activities Conference starts today (April 29) with a poster session from 3 to 5:30 p.m. in Freeborn Hall, and continues with oral presentations from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday (April 30) in Wellman Hall. The conference is free and open to the public, with no registration required.
“We’ve always prepared and inspired our students to discover solutions to some of society’s most pressing problems,” said Patricia Turner, vice provost for Undergraduate Studies. “The Undergraduate Research Scholarship and Creative Activities Conference gives our students a chance to both exhibit the fruits of their research and give them a taste of the process of presenting it in a scholarly manner.”
C-STEM Day
This is a free program for kindergarten-through-12th-grade educators, students and parents — to learn about the challenges of teaching the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and math) and the possibilities for success in those fields.
C-STEM Day is scheduled for Saturday (April 30), with registration at 8:30 a.m. and the program starting at 9.
The sponsors are the College of Engineering and UC Davis' K-14 Outreach Center for Computing and STEM Education, or C-STEM Center for short. The center works for better instruction in computing, science, technology, engineering and mathematics, in formal and informal programs for kindergarten through grade 14 (second year of college), and to inspire these students to pursue C-STEM careers and post-secondary study.
The C-STEM Day program includes a secondary school programming competition, the Symposium on Computing and STEM Education in the 21st Century, and robot demonstrations and lab tours.
ARISE Research Symposium
Professor Adela de la Torre, professor and chair of Chicana/o studies, is the principal investigator on the ARISE project, which offers assistance in science education for seventh- through 12th-grade teachers in the Central Valley, and their English-learning students.
ARISE stands for Addiction Research and Investigation for Science Educators. “Addiction” in the program title refers to the subjects — neuroscience and substance abuse — in which the teachers receive intensive training. Grant funding comes from the National Institute on Drug Abuse at the National Institutes of Health.
Each participating teacher attends a weeklong summer institute at UC Davis. Then, in yearlong partnerships with university researchers, the teachers guide their students in class research projects — nurturing success in this vulnerable student population: English learners.
The students will present their research at the symposium, scheduled from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday (April 30) in Freeborn Hall. Some 400 teachers, students and parents are expected to attend.
Spring Sustainability Convergence
California college students are meeting at UC Davis today through Sunday (April 29-May 1) for the 10th annual Spring Sustainability Convergence, hosted by the UC Davis chapter of the California Stuents Sustainability Coalition and the Campus Center for the Environment.
A UC Davis news release described the convergence as a a forum to build community, share resources and best practices, plan action, attend workshops, celebrate, and actively collaborate on campus policies, research projects and curriculum.
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Dave Jones, Dateline, 530-752-6556, dljones@ucdavis.edu