Come join your fellow chemistry teachers and local chemistry professionals to learn about nanotechnology.  If you know of any individuals who would be interested in this FREE professional development session, forward this message to them.  Please RSVP to Barb Sauer (barb@paperdiscoverycenter.org) by Friday, September 30 so we have an accurate number for lunch.  Reply to Kara Pezzi (pezzikara@aasd.k12.wi.us) if you would like to be removed from the distribution list.

Nano-technology:  Short Presentations, followed by a Discussion Café

PRESENTATIONS (~1 hour total)

-          Visiting assistant professor, Maryuri Roca at Lawrence University, will discuss her research and her Nano-chemistry courses.   She received her PhD from Baylor University and was a post-doctoral fellow in nanotechnology at the University of Iowa.   Among the courses she teaches is Chem 225 - Nanoscience and Nanotechnology.    

-          Dr. Greg Schueneman, PhD, Performance Enhanced Biopolymers - Forest Products Laboratory, will be presenting the research at the Forest Products Laboratory in Nanotechnology.

-          Barb Sauer, educator at the Paper Discovery Center, will discuss the educational tools she has received from the NISE (Nano-technology Informal Science Education) network and new tools unveiled in the regional conference held in Sept 2011 at the Museum of Science and Industry in St. Paul, Minnesota.

DISCUSSION café (~1 hour total)

The group will participate in a discussion café about Nano-technology – it’s a great opportunity to experience this new tool being used in industry and academia on a first hand basis.     In their book, World Café: Shaping Our Future Through Conversations That Matter, Juanita Brown and David Isaacs explain the process and provide examples of how it has led to valuable insights in government, academia, and business.  The café discussion technique is a best practice highlighted in a NSTA (National Science Teachers Association) published book - Exemplary Science In Informal Education Settings: Standards-Based Success Stories by Robert Yager.

LUNCH – provided by Northeast Wisconsin Local Section of the American Chemical Society; may include a debrief of the café discussion.