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Inspiring,
Enthusing, & Enveloping Students with Science
Dr
Janine Young
Marketing and Communication, National Youth Science Forum
This
is my second WWDS entry and a year on, things are very different
from my first entry. I now work for the National Youth Science
Forum (www.nysf.edu.au),
where we aim to inspire and enthuse students entering their
final year of high school about futures in science, engineering
and related disciplines. We do not teach science but involve
the students in science through meeting scientists and visiting
their labs across January each year. It's been running since
1984, but I've only been on board doing the marketing
and communication since early February of this year.
My WWDS was very long. I moved house the
day before and was very tired when I turned up to work early
on the 12th. My mood was lifted, however, when I walked into
the office and saw many boxes containing thousands of our
recently-redesigned and printed posters and flyers. Five
thousand accompanying information books
were delivered around 10.30am and
suddenly there was no room left in the office. A number of
student volunteers turned up just before lunch to start collating
and stuffing envelopes, as the posters, flyers and books needed
to be sent to every high school and Rotary Club in Australia
- but I retreated to the safety of my desk to avoid having
to take part for as long as possible.
We found out that one of our university partners has decided
to pull out of the January 2007 forum; so much of the morning
was spent discussing the ramifications. At 1pm,
the Director (Geoff Burchfield) and I went to an Executive
meeting of our Council (which went for more than
two and a half hours) and then on to another meeting at 3.45pm
with a laboratory I want to arrange for our students to visit
during the January sessions. Came back to the office and ate
my lunch of leftover chinese food at 4.45pm.
The rest of the afternoon and into the night were spent collating
the recently-delivered publications (two posters, six flyers,
one book; two posters, six flyers, one book...), placing them
into folders and then into envelopes. The first 500
were fun, and then it wasn't fun any more (we did
close to 1800 by the time we left).
The six of us had takeaway Greek food for dinner at about
8.30pm, and I left work a little
after 10.30pm with very
sore shoulders, and my hands torn to ribbons by paper-cuts
(I bleed for my work). I drove one of our student volunteers
back to his college and then had a hot milk and stretched
on the floor before collapsing gratefully into bed.
This is absolutely not a typical
day in our small, but very productive, office. I
usually work in the much safer environment of my computer,
desk, and phone. Much of my time is spent talking
with students, partners
and teachers.
This is not the kind of work I
thought I'd be doing when I was in
high school - I had wanted to be medical researcher.
But once I actually became one, I realised I did not like
it all that much and changed direction. I am now much happier
and comfortable with what I do, and I love coming to work
every day - except when there's 3000 envelopes to be stuffed.
Our director, Geoff, and Stephan folding and stuffing envelopes.
L-R: Jenna, Nathan, me (no, the knife in my hand does not
mean anything), Sandra (our Operations Manager) and Stephan.
All the white folders at the back still needed to be stuffed
into envelopes ...
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