My Adventures at Imperial
Hi!
As you can probably tell by the name of this blog, I'm pretty big into STEM. But I wasn't always like that, believe it or not I used to hate maths and science with a passion, and a large part of the reason why was because it was soooooo BORING!!! But that changed at some point because I got invited to do a whole bunch of cool things.
Recently I was lucky enough to get accepted to the Year 10 Insights Summer school at Imperial College London and to be perfectly honest I didn't know what to expect.
We all walked in one by one, carefully selecting our seat, trying to sit as far away from the next human being as possible. A room full of 42 semi-socially awkward young people, who didn't know each other... Yep, just as awkward as it sounds.
But any who, they got us all to introduce ourselves with a series of painstaking ice breakers, They were cheesy but extremely effective because by the end of it we were speaking as if we'd known each other our whole lives. Partly because we were all so like-minded that it was crazy and for the first time in ages, I could make some kind of science joke or a mathematical comment and then wouldn't have to explain every part of it afterwards... That is a very rare occurrence- Trust me it really is.
While we were there we had the option of studying Science or Engineering for the week and me, being a science fanatic, you can guess what I chose. We had three science lessons and one maths lesson and this wasn't your average high school maths lesson.. No, this was hard core. 3 hours of topology and probability with stuff I'd never even heard of before but regardless of this, I loved it. It was the most difficult maths lesson I have ever had in my life but I loved it.
Science was also crazy cool, 3 hours of physics, chemistry and biology each and again this isn't the high school science lessons that your use to where if the Bunsen burners come out it becomes a special occasion. No, no, no, we were using all sorts of chemicals, again that I haven't heard of before and were almost impossible to say. Try saying this one: Potassium Hexocyanoferrate, it took me 4 attempts before I could say it right! We also plated copper coins in 'Silver' and 'Gold'.. okay maybe I am exaggerating slightly, it was Zinc and Brass but it still looked cool!
Oh and here's a fun fact for you: Play-dough is a electrical conductor so don't you go sticking it into electrical sockets, not that you were thinking of doing that anyways. Stay safe! ;)
This experience and so many like this, that I will tell you about in due time have shaped me to become who I am today and I wouldn't trade them for the world. So my advice to you is to take opportunities as they come to you (to an extent, don't over work yourself) and make the most of them while you can.
Stay Curious,
Vanessa x
As you can probably tell by the name of this blog, I'm pretty big into STEM. But I wasn't always like that, believe it or not I used to hate maths and science with a passion, and a large part of the reason why was because it was soooooo BORING!!! But that changed at some point because I got invited to do a whole bunch of cool things.
Recently I was lucky enough to get accepted to the Year 10 Insights Summer school at Imperial College London and to be perfectly honest I didn't know what to expect.
We all walked in one by one, carefully selecting our seat, trying to sit as far away from the next human being as possible. A room full of 42 semi-socially awkward young people, who didn't know each other... Yep, just as awkward as it sounds.
But any who, they got us all to introduce ourselves with a series of painstaking ice breakers, They were cheesy but extremely effective because by the end of it we were speaking as if we'd known each other our whole lives. Partly because we were all so like-minded that it was crazy and for the first time in ages, I could make some kind of science joke or a mathematical comment and then wouldn't have to explain every part of it afterwards... That is a very rare occurrence- Trust me it really is.
While we were there we had the option of studying Science or Engineering for the week and me, being a science fanatic, you can guess what I chose. We had three science lessons and one maths lesson and this wasn't your average high school maths lesson.. No, this was hard core. 3 hours of topology and probability with stuff I'd never even heard of before but regardless of this, I loved it. It was the most difficult maths lesson I have ever had in my life but I loved it.
Science was also crazy cool, 3 hours of physics, chemistry and biology each and again this isn't the high school science lessons that your use to where if the Bunsen burners come out it becomes a special occasion. No, no, no, we were using all sorts of chemicals, again that I haven't heard of before and were almost impossible to say. Try saying this one: Potassium Hexocyanoferrate, it took me 4 attempts before I could say it right! We also plated copper coins in 'Silver' and 'Gold'.. okay maybe I am exaggerating slightly, it was Zinc and Brass but it still looked cool!
Oh and here's a fun fact for you: Play-dough is a electrical conductor so don't you go sticking it into electrical sockets, not that you were thinking of doing that anyways. Stay safe! ;)
This experience and so many like this, that I will tell you about in due time have shaped me to become who I am today and I wouldn't trade them for the world. So my advice to you is to take opportunities as they come to you (to an extent, don't over work yourself) and make the most of them while you can.
Stay Curious,
Vanessa x
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