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MARCH 2017
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VOLUME 55, NO. 1
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CELEBRATING 55 YEARS OF SCIENCE EDUCATION
Youth Science Center is in
Room 17 at Bixby Elementary School
(across from Wilson High School)
16446 Wedgeworth Drive
Hacienda Heights, CA 91745
(626) 854-9825
YSC LAUNCHES NEW WEBSITE. Please go to
www.youthsciencecenter.org and let us know what you think!
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Click here to make an online donation!
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Keynote speaker Nanxi Liu was interviewed by Anne Lam of Lajajakids.com. Hear her comments on why college
is the best time to start a business
here.
Nanxi Liu co-founded 2 companies by the time she graduated from Cal Berkeley - Nanoly Bioscience and Enplug, Inc. Nanoly developed a polymer that enables vaccines to survive without refrigeration - a real life saver for third world countries. Enplug is the world's leading company that builds open software for displays used in stadiums, retail stores, banks, restaurants and many other businesses around the world. Nanxi was named one of Forbes 30 Under 30 and Fortune Magazine's Top 10 Most Promising Women Entrepeneurs.
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SAVE THE DATE!!!
OCTOBER 22, 2017
YOUTH SCIENCE CENTER GALA
Mark your calendar for the 55th Anniversary of the Youth Science Center. This year's celebration will be at the Friendly Hills Country Club in Whittier. Social hour/silent auction begins at 5 pm and the dinner program will start at 6 pm.
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After School Program Available To Come to Your School
The afterschool program has attracted a lot of interest from both public and private schools. The YSC's afterschool programs were given in Hacienda Heights, LaVerne, Pomona, Rowland Heights, West Covina, Whittier and Diamond Bar.
Class topics include model rocketry, aerodynamics, 3D printing, GoPro video making, iPad Sphero, electronics, chemistry, physics, biology and botany.
For information on scheduling the program at your school, contact
Project Manager Diana Padilla at 626 588-7818 or email at
diana@youthsciencecenter.org. A class series usually consists of 6 weekly ninety-minute classes.
Anyone interested in teaching these classes should also
contact Diana Padilla. This is a good opportunity for college students majoring in science or education.
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New Starlab Portable Planetarium For in-school Classes
and Nighttime Star Parties
Our portable Starlab Planetarium is available for during the school day and for evening programs. We have upgraded to the latest version of Starry Night software which has many new capabilities along with a new MacBook Pro laptop. The Starlab can seat up to 35 persons per program. Contact Ron Chong at (626) 854-9825 for details.
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Program Donations Received By YSC
Thanks to the Union Pacific Foundation for a $3500 grant for STEM classes and to the US Bancorp Foundation for a $6000 grant for general operating support
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Also received were personal donations from Bill and Pam Hsu, Dorothy Chu and
Phyllis Vandeventer.
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GET READY FOR THE YSC SUMMER PROGRAM!
It won't be long before summer is here! The summer program this year will be from June 5 to July 7 at Bixby
Elementary School. Please send an email to
ysc@youthsciencecenter.org if you would like to receive
an email alert when the schedule is available, which will
be around April 1st.
Because 4th of July is on a Tuesday, there will be no
classes on July 3rd. Classes for this short week will be combined
with the classes beginning on June 26.
New this year include "Defending Against Hackers - Cybersecurity", "Minecraft Survival World Geology and Topography", "Minecraft: Redstone Body Systems and Calculators", "Minecraft Video Game Creation and Cellular Biology", "Book Trailer Films", "Crime Catchers and Spy Science", "Get STEAMED!", "Fishline Physics", "Earth Science for Every Kid," "Shock & Awe: The Mystery Around Electromagnets," and "Fossil Hunters".
Students in middle and high school interested in volunteering in the summer program as classroom aides can download a volunteer form here.
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YSC BOARD TO ELECT NEW DIRECTORS
The following persons were nominated to serve on the YSC Board of Directors. The election will be held at the next board meeting on April 24, 2017.
Stan Liu, Entrepreneur and COO of Baby Appleseed
Julie Nyugen, Insurance Manager at Farmers Insurance
Chad Wilson, Attorney with Lanaka & Hanna
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2017 Spring Festival Attracts Hundreds of Visitors
The YSC again had a popular exhibit area at the Spring Festival held at Schabarum Park on March 4th. Visitors were excited to see and touch (the brave ones) the tarantula, hissing cockroaches, walking sticks and the bearded dragon.
Above: Phyllis Vandeventer and Judy Chong helping young visitors do a make and take paper snake activity.
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SanDist Earth Day 2017
Come join the fun and visit YSC at the Sanitation District 2017 Earth Day Celebration,
1955 Workman Mill Road in North Whittier. Shuttle bus service is provided from the west parking lot at Crossroads Parkway. The event will be held from 10 am to 2 pm. Lots of activities and entertainment!
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Happy Pi Day!
Pi Day is celebrated on March 14th (3/14) around the world. Pi (Greek letter "
π") is the symbol used in mathematics to represent a constant - the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter - which is approximately 3.14159.
Pi has been calculated to over one trillion digits beyond its decimal point. As an irrational and transcendental number, it will continue infinitely without repetition or pattern. While only a handful of digits are needed for typical calculations, Pi's infinite nature makes it a fun challenge to memorize, and to computationally calculate more and more digits.
Learn more about Pi at www.piday.org.
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Earth Day Activities
Chino - April 20 4 to 7 pm. At the Chino Creek Wetlands
and Educational Park
Baldwin Park Arbor Day - April 22 10 to 1 pm. Morgan Park
Diamond Bar Earth Day - April 22 9 to 1. AQMD Parking Lot
Glendora Earth Day - April 22 9 to 3. Glendora Civic Center
West Covina Earth & Arbor Day - April 22 9 to 1. Cameron Park
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Special Ed Arts Festival
The YSC will be participating in this Arts Festival with some of our animals and art activities for the kids. The Festival is for Grades K-12 and is sponsored by the Rowland and Hacienda Special Education Local Plan Area groups.
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Area Middle Schools Named Schools to Watch
for 2016-2017
These schools were named as model middle schools by California's Schools to Watch - Taking Center Stage program. These schools were named as being on a path to success. They have best practices which can be shared with lower performing schools.
Alvarado Intermediate (Rowland USD)
Chaparral Middle (Walnut USD)
Clifton Middle (Monrovia)
Rancho Starbuck (Lowell Joint)
Suzanne Middle (Walnut USD)
Torch Middle (Bassett USD)
Yorba Linda Middle (Yorba Linda)
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2017 Academic Decathlon Results
South Pasadena High School has won the 2017 Los Angeles County Academic Decathlon for the third consecutive year.
The team bested all others with a tally of 56,462.10 points, improving their score for the third time. Last year's score was 55,373.90 points, higher than the previous year's 52,572.50 points (out of a possible 60,000).
South Pasadena automatically advanced to the California Academic Decathlon, set for March 23-26 in Sacramento. But because their scores were high enough to qualify, an additional seven teams were invited to compete in the state Decathlon as "wild-card" entrants.
The 2017 results were announced Feb. 9 by LACOE Communications Director Frank Kwan in award ceremonies at the Quiet Cannon Country Club in Montebello.
More than 500 students from 60 teams, which included 17 practice squads, participated in the decathlon that is annually presented by LACOE.
The top-scoring individual decathlete was Benjamin Lin of Edgewood High School, with a score of 9,497.50 (out of a possible 10,000). He was followed by Nathaniel Lyons, also of Edgewood High School, with 9,140.20 points. Third place went to Anthony Chen from South Pasadena High School, who tallied 9,041.60 points.
The competition, which this year focused on the study theme of World War II, took place Jan. 28 and Feb. 4 at El Rancho High School in Pico Rivera. The contest is open to public high schools in the county that are outside of the Los Angeles Unified School District. LAUSD holds a separate competition and awards ceremony.
The Academic Decathlon is a local-county/state/national honors program designed to promote self-assurance, academic enrichment and teamwork among students from a diversity of academic backgrounds.
Decathlon teams are comprised of students from all grade-point averages. Decathletes are challenged to use analytical skills, performance abilities and test-taking and writing aptitude in 10 subjects: Art, Economics, Essay, Interview, Language & Literature, Math, Music, Social Science, Speech and Super Quiz.
The winning team, along with top-scoring squads that qualified as "wild-card" entrants, will participate in the California Academic Decathlon. The winning team at state advances to the U.S. Academic Decathlon scheduled for April 20-22 in Madison, Wisconsin.
Watch highlights of the 2016 L.A. County Academic Decathlon here.
Key team and individual results follow:
Overall Team Scores (out of a possible 60,000 points):
1. South Pasadena High School -- South Pasadena Unified School District -- 56,462.10
2. Edgewood High School -- West Covina Unified School District- 55,981.90
3. West High School -- Torrance Unified School District -- 52,889.00
4. Mark Keppel High School -- Alhambra Unified School District -- 51,034.60
5. Redondo Union High School -- Redondo Beach Unified School District -- 46,988.20
6. Beverly Hills High School -- Beverly Hills Unified School District- 45,473.90
7. Alhambra High School -- Alhambra Unified School District -- 44,934.60
8. El Rancho High School -- El Rancho Unified School District -- 44,046.40
9. Rosemead High School -- El Monte Union High School District -- 43,405.50
10. Burbank High School -- Burbank Unified School District -- 43,372.70
Top 3 Overall Individual Scorers (out of a possible 10,000 points):
1. Benjamin Lin, Edgewood High School -- 9,497.50 points
2. Nathaniel Lyons, Edgewood High School -- 9,140.20 points
3. Anthony Chen, South Pasadena High School -- 9,041.60 points
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25 Top Paying Jobs in 2017
Survey results from GLASSDOOR.COM
Median base pay for jobs in the U.S. based on
at least 100 salary reports.
1. Physician $187,876
2. Pharmacy Manager $149,064
3. Patent Attorney $139,272
4. Medical Science Liaison $132,842
5. Pharmacist $125,847
6. Enterprise Architect $112,560
7. Physicans Assistant* $112,529
8. Applications Development Mgr $112,045
9. R&D Manager $111,905
10. Corporate Controller $110,855
11. Software Engineering Mgr $109,350
12. IT Architect $105,303
13. Software Architect $104,574
14. Nurse Practionioner* $104,144
15. Solutions Architect $102,678
16. Data Architect $102,091
17. Actuary $99,507
18. IT Program Manager $99,883
19. User Experience Manager $98,353
20. System Architect $97,873
21. Plant Manager $97,189
22. Scrum Master** $95,167
23. Financial Planning Mgr $94,862
24. Nuclear Engineer $94,852
25. Attorney $94,695
* Jobs with the most reported openings
** Facilitator for an agile development team
For the original article with job descriptions, click here.
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48th Ag District News
Read the latest 48th newsletter here.
This year's Agriculture Fair will be held May 16-20 at the Pomona Fairgrounds. The theme is "Food Grows Where Water Flows"
The 48th DAA office is located at Building F10 Farm Road, Mt San Antonio College Campus, 1100 N Grand Avenue, Walnut 91789. They have a wide variety of agriculture resource materials available to teachers. Teachers who receive the materials agree to have their students participate in the annual fair in May at the Fairplex in Pomona. Phone (909) 274-2433 for more information. or go to www.agfair.org.
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Shop your back to school items at Smile.Amazon.com
Support us when you shop for back-to-school items and all other purchases.
and Amazon donates a portion of every sale to the Youth Science Center.
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Visiting the Hacienda Heights Youth Science Center
The Youth Science Center operates a hands-on science center at
Bixby Elementary School in Hacienda Heights. The Center is open Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 2 to 4:30 pm. Visitors should check in at the school office first to get directions to our location in Room 17.
During the school year the YSC is open Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 2:30 pm to 4:00 pm. Please call ahead at (626) 588-7818 if you wish to visit
.
Visiting guests can also enjoy the Youth Science Center store, which is stocked with various science related materials. For more information regarding the Youth Science Center please call (626) 854-9825.
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The official newsletter of the Youth Science Center is published February, April, June, October and December. The Youth Science Center was founded in 1962 in Fullerton. The Hacienda Heights branch was established in 1984. The Youth Science Center's Tax ID Number is 95-2273238.
YSC Board of Directors: Youth Science Center Staff:
Chairman: Ron Chong Museum and Summer Director: Diana Padilla
Vice-Chairman: Roger Huynh
Treasurer: Philip Teders Summer Principals: Phyllis Vandeventer
and Dee Rathman
Secretary: Victor Wu Summer Registration: Caroline Weatherford
Members of the Board of Directors: Star Lab Instructors: Patricia Smith, Lyle Majeska
Scott Bevans and Karla Magana
Piyusha Perera
Vicky Soong
Phyllis
Vandeventer
Member at Large:
Rolin Soong , Kim Bach, Pat Smith,
William Lundberg Anita Tam
Thaminda Ramanayake
Administrative Aide: Kevin Torres
Project Manager: Diana Padilla
Curriculum Development: Kathleen Randall
Office Assistant: Denise Franco, Nancy Garcia
Antenna Editor: Ron Chong
Bookkeeping: Edy Au and Vicki Lee
Circulation this issue: 1,564
YSC Website www.youthsciencecenter.org supported and funded by Ryan Gagajena of My Web Design Source
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