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Candidate event in our data for a cosmic ray air shower! |
QuarkNet is an educational outreach program sponsored by the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy. Its goal is to support science education in high schools by establishing a nation-wide physics teacher network. It provides opportunities for students to learn first-hand about frontline physics research taking place in universities, and establish mentor relationships with their science teachers and physics professors at universities. It also allows students to design and run their own experiments.
The QuarkNet Center at Florida Tech was established in 2002 by Profs. Laszlo Baksay and Marcus Hohlmann of the High Energy Physics Group. The center has hosted several week-long teacher workshops through 2006. In the summers of 2005 & 2006, a resident high school physics teachers and four high school students participated each year in a six-week-long Research Experience in the P/SS Department, which was organized by Prof. Hohlmann as Principal Investigator. The NSF has supported the Fl. Tech QuarkNet Center with a total of $67,000 up to now. During the regular school year, teachers in the surrounding high schools use cosmic ray muon detectors dto bring hands-on physics to their high school classroom. We plan to continue the program in 2006/07 with more workshops including an extended summer workshop in 2007.
Recent Events:
2006 Quarknet Workshop, June 5 - July 142005 QuarkNet Workshop
June 13-17, 2005
2005 QuarkNet Follow-Up Workshop
April 8, 2005