Science Olympiad at COD

In high school my friends and I were perennial participants in Science Olympiad, a national organization dedicated to getting students engaged with science and engineering. Having won several medals at both the regional and state levels and enjoyed nearly every minute with my team in and out of competition, I have since tried to help out with SciOly competitions nearly every year since graduating.

My specialty was the big-ticket biology events, namely Cell Biology (basically general biology), and Designer Genes (genetics/genomics), and I've been privileged to write tests for these events for both North Carolina and Illinois competitions. This year I wrote a Cell Bio test for the Illinois regional tournament held at the College of DuPage (COD). I find it tougher each year to write an age- and skill-appropriate test, though I think I did pretty well this time. The highest percentage result I had on the Designer Genes test I wrote two years ago was 60% from NCSSM (an elite, nationally-ranked science and math school for 11th and 12th graders). Those numbers are slightly worse than what you see on graduate exams! This time my highest was right around 80% while the lowest was about 25%.

It's interesting to interact with science-oriented high schoolers after so long. I'm always amazed by the great range in knowledge there is. I heard one student from a team exclaim confidently that while the cell they identified was from a plant it was definitely prokaryotic too. I just smiled and tried not to laugh. I put some tough questions on there that I didn't really expect anyone to get right, but some were total gimmies. I just wish I had a copy of the exams I took so that I could try to make mine as fair and reasonable as possible. Maybe next year...

I didn't attend the tournament alone. Kevin drove me and Nikhil (a housemate) there and we met up with Yan, another material sciences student at NU who went to UC as an undergrad (a connection to each of us!) While those three managed the Chemistry Lab event (which Kevin also wrote), I handled Cell Bio mostly on my own (they helped set up and brought me pizza for lunch). Overall we had a pretty good time, though I have to say our location in NC (Garner High School) was much better.

After getting all of scores in (and checking them twice) we left around four. It was an odd time between lunch and dinner and we were kinda hungry but unable to pick a place to eat, despite my GPS giving lots of choices. I missed a Culver's and couldn't find another, so we settled for Baskin Robbins. Turns out the one the GPS pointed us to was in a mall, so we ended up getting different choices from a food court to make everyone happy. For a poor economy and a late Saturday afternoon the place was absolutely packed. We made it back to Hyde Park around 6 where I caught up a bit with Bonnie and Jeffrey before messing around on my computer. Great day!

Radio City Skating Ya'll

When I moved to Chicago about 18 months ago, I only really knew one person here. Since then, other friends from times recent and past have moved to the city. I really need to find the time to hang out with more of them and haven't done a great job so far. Fortunately, Kevin's been a help here. He came up with the idea of bimonthly/monthly meals that he, Megha Bisarya (our Cary friend from high school), and I could share. Genius! After some deliberation we decided that today would be the day.

As you might know I'm not exactly the most social person, and thus my Friday evenings are typically low-key. Thus it was weird to suddenly have four different places I wanted to be on a Friday night: 1) dining with Aneta, Jeff, and Tim, 2) watching Tropic Thunder at movie night, 3) watching Battlestar with Matt, and 4) attending WBEZ/Chicago Public Radio's open house followed by ice-skating and dinner with Kevin and Megha. Naturally, I picked option 4.

I left lab surprisingly early (3:45) in order to catch a bus to Navy Pier by 5. WBEZ is lucky enough to broadcast from the most visited destination in all of Chicago (and the state of Illinois for that matter). Tim, my lab mate, thought an hour to get to the Pier was a bit excessive, but given the stifling traffic we encountered on Lakeshore Drive (also called LSD, hah) it took a solid hour to go about 9 miles. Yeah.

It took some hunting to find the studios at the Pier, but at last I got there. The party was just getting started. There was a swag table set up and the first thing I thought was "buttons!" I picked up several of those along with a Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me magnet, some bumper stickers, etc. They even provided bags to hold all the swag. How sweet. Mingling solo is easy for some people, but not for me. I just feel so awkward entering other people's conversations. I picked up a glass of 312 (brewed by Goose Island, a local brewery, and named after downtown Chicago's area code...click "no" for the 'are you over 21?' question on the website), and started wandering. I admired the (open) trophy case which housed an Emmy for This American Life, several Peabody awards, among other honors. Walked past the DJ from Sound Opinions and headed out onto the terrace to admire the view of downtown Chicago and Lake Michigan. Got over my awkwardness and joined a group of staffers. Talked to some people who work on fundraising and community outreach. Nice people!

Needed to warm up so I went back inside and started to see how far I could explore before someone said I shouldn't be there. Peeked into the lunchroom (nice vending machines) and as I passed some studios I saw a tour group heading into one. I slipped in behind the last person and got to visit a recording studio where live music acts play (complete with piano and fancily designed wood panelling for acoustics), another recording studio, and the main office area where pretty much everyone works. It's a giant cube farm with several nice flat-screen TVs posted around the walls. No one, not even the execs, has a doored office, just bigger cubes. It's a very egalitarian setup and apparently convenient for impromptu meetings. We got to meet Richard Steele, a longtime radio man and one of the hosts for EightForty-Eight (which I discovered just today was named after WBEZ's street address: 848 W Grand Ave). He talked about what it was like to work for WBEZ and some of the challenges the employees face by working (as opposed to just visiting) Navy Pier; food prices are astronomical, commuting can be a real pain, and all those tourists can be really annoying (and clueless) sometimes (example, people standing next to the ferris wheel and asking where it is). Seems a great guy.

I was supposed to meet up with Megha and Kev at 7 by Millennium Park so I left after the tour. It's a bit of a hike to get back to the Loop from the Pier, but it was a beautiful if chilly night and I had my camera. There's something about cities at night that I just love. The lights, the bustle, the way everything takes on this otherwordly look. Daytime means work, nighttime means play. I took my own sweet time walking down since I'm rarely downtown in the evening and just had to take advantage of the clear sky and shining moon. Please see facebook for the pics.

Finally met Megha at a Dunkin' Donuts where we chatted and waited for Kevin. By 7:15 we were at the skating rink in Millennium Park for its last week staying open (who knows, though, it might snow in April). The line was mercifully short and the rink not too busy so we got our skates and got laced up in no time (though Megha needed some help tightening hers). I don't consider myself a very good skater, Kevin's much better, but I felt good enough on the ice to move pretty quickly, smoothly, and confidently. I hate falling, while doing anything, so I'll never be great until I'm ready to get hurt. Oh well.

Skating was a blast. Kev thought it'd be a great idea to try swing dancing on ice and I agreed. Megha taped us with my camera and the result is hilarious if not terribly well executed. It's harder than it looks at the Olympics!

We stopped around 8:30, just before the ice was set to be zambonied, again, and took the El to Grand Ave to find a Mexican place, Su Casa, Megha suggested. We shared some dishes and had a nice conversation. There was a lot of food and while Megha and I were stuffed, Kev suggested we grab some ice cream from the Coldstone we passed on the way to the restaurant. We protested but agreed anyway, and naturally ate some of his minty chocolately delight (I don't remember what it was called but it was delicious). Coldstone kicked us out at 11 and we decided we should probably head to our respective homes.

All in all, it was a fabulous evening and I hope to repeat it soon!