Cal State East Bay’s Oct. 29 ‘Discovery Day

Cal State East Bay’s Oct. 29 ‘Discovery Day’ kicks off Bay Area Science Festival

October 29

www20.csueastbay.edu/csci/festival

In late October, Cal State East Bay’s Hayward Campus will become the center of science for the San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California.

On Saturday, Oct. 29, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., CSUEB’s College of Science will host the first event in a 10-day series of science-related programs making up the Bay Area Science Festival running through Nov. 6 at locations throughout the region. The university’s Hayward campus is located at 25800 Carlos Bee Boulevard.

“Discovery Days” at Cal State East Bay will feature experiments, demonstrations, exhibits, hands-on activities, and lectures “to delight everyone young and old,” said Michael Leung, dean of CSUEB’s College of Science.

Although science festivals are not new to Cal State East Bay – they’ve been a biennial tradition since 1974 – this is the first time that CSUEB will participate in a regional festival with other leading science organizations from throughout the Bay Area and Northern California. The purpose of the Bay Area festival is to show how the region is an unparalleled world leader in science and technology, said event organizers.

“The Bay Area has long been a worldwide leader in science and technology innovation, and this region remains an incubator of countless breakthroughs,” said Susan Desmond-Hellman, chancellor for the University of California, San Francisco, which received a grant from the National Science Foundation to create the regional event.

For CSUEB’s festival, approximately 50 activities – including a chemistry magic show – are scheduled, and many will encourage participation from the audience and school-age children. Selected presentations featured include: “Life of a Criminalist;” geophysical prospecting; observing the sun through a telescope; computer simulation; robot in action; sea slugs; mathematical puzzles; fossil casting; potpourri of physics; bugs and other creatures.

Health screenings also will be offered to those in attendance.

In addition to CSUEB faculty-led activities, demonstrations and experiments are planned that will be facilitated by scientists and other world renowned experts from Chabot Space and Science Center, Lawrence Hall of Science, Lawrence Livermore National Lab, Sandia Labs, The Tech Museum and UC San Francisco.

“California State University, East Bay’s College of Science has a tradition of opening its facilities to the community with the goal of bringing science awareness to the largest possible audience,” Leung said. “By joining forces with the Bay Area Science Festival, we will make that happen. The Science Festival is an important event to the university, as Cal State East Bay is committed to an increased focus on STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education as a way of preparing our students to fill the current and future workforce needs of this region.”

Previous festivals at CSUEB each have drawn more than 5,000 attendees, and a similar size crowd is expected this year, said Charlene Lebastchi, festival coordinator and College of Science staff member.

Find additional information about CSUEB’s Discovery Day festival online. For details about scheduling and locations of other events in the Bay Area Science Festival visit www.bayareascience.org.