Topics and Expertise: science education

Rocket science? For these kids, pressure is fun

Fri Jul 7, 2017
kids building bottle rocket

Javier Chavez, left, and Sebastian Mederos, fifth grade, work together to design their bottle rocket.

Every good scientific exploration starts with questions, and at UCSF’s 2017 Summer Science Camp, the recent “bottle rocket engineering and launch day” was no different.

Camp founder continues quest to bring science to kids

Thu Jun 29, 2017
Hertema
Cindy Chew

Heather Hertema, PharmD ’10, founder of UCSF Summer Science Camp, returned for the camp’s 10th anniversary.

As a first-year UCSF PharmD student, Heather Hertema, PharmD ’10, had a big idea: a free summer camp for kids who might not otherwise be exposed to the creative problem-solving and making-things-explode fun of science.

A decade of launching rockets, cardboard boats—and kids into STEM

Tue Jun 20, 2017
kids raising hands
© majedphoto.com

Each year, Summer Science Camp brings 55 fifth- and sixth-grade students to the UCSF campus for a free week of learning and fun.

Ten years ago, at the inaugural UCSF Summer Science Camp, 10-year-old Najwa Anasse held a human brain in her hands—an “Aha!” experience that set her career path.

“I thought, ‘Oh my god, I want to study this.’ I was so excited,” says Anasse, who grew up in San Francisco’s Excelsior District and was...

Two to watch

Thu May 13, 2010
two bi-planes viewed against bright clouds
They are intellectually fearless and a bit unorthodox. They form a crazy quilt of undergraduate majors, birthplaces, interests, and experiences. They work across UCSF in “wet” labs fitted with benches and large metal fume hoods and in “dry” labs amid cubicles and work surfaces topped with computers...

UCSF student pharmacists teach science to 5th-graders

Wed Oct 31, 2007
a student pharmacist observes two fifth-graders work on a project.
Susan Merrell
UCSF student pharmacists relate science to the everyday lives of 5th-graders at San Francisco’s Rosa Parks Elementary School through a special program now in its second year.