Camp gives youths chance
to solve hypothetical crime
By Ian Clift
Summer Reporter
High school and middle school students will use
physics, biology, chemistry and math in order to "solve" a crime in
a youth camp sponsored by the Multicultural Science Programs at Purdue.
The two-week program, which began Monday, will
lead minority students through various scientific disciplines in search
of evidence about one of five suspects who could have committed a murder.
In the exercise, students will be given information
about a crime and then led through various stations during the week
to do the appropriate analysis of the evidence, said Regina Hicks, director
of multicultural science programs.
"We are bringing underrepresented groups here to
expose them and to heighten their awareness of career opportunities
in science," she said.
Four outreach coordinators within the School of
Science designed the program. The program is repeated once each week
during the next two weeks. This week will include 15 high school students
and next week will include 30 middle school students.
Julia Hains, outreach coordinator for the department
of chemistry, said, "You'll see middle school kids doing things that
people don't think they can do. Every day they're getting different
pieces of the puzzle, like (Monday) they worked with physics and determined
the length of a bone."
In addition, students will do a soil analysis,
an ink and lipstick analysis, a foot print analysis and DNA testing.
Each test conducted will be similar to an actual
test done in a crime lab, said Hains. The students will handle instruments
that many will not see again until they enter college. Hains is also
coordinator for the Chemobile lab equipment program at Purdue.
"An introduction to instrumentation, research has
shown, will improve an interest in science," she said. "High school
is too late, we've already lost them by that time, so were targeting
middle school children in many of these cases."
Hicks said on Friday the students will present
their results in a poster presentation. "It will state their hypothesis
and what is the basis for their conclusions."
Similar programs began in 1986 with only high school
students, in an attempt to get them involved in the pursuit of science.
Hicks began including middle schools 11 years ago when she began her
position at Purdue.
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