LABRats Receives $150,000 Grant

Shawn Carlson, Ph.D., Founder and Director of the Society for Amateur Scientists

This is a great day for science literacy.

A generous Bostonian businessman who understands LABRats' true potential has given our program $150,000! This brings us within shouting distance of the $200,000 that we estimate it will take to prepare LABRats for its national launch. Now our content development effort can switch into "full steam ahead" mode.

Online-Program Success: If you search on "science fair" in Google for you'll find that www.scifair.org, my own science fair support website where I recruit new LABRats members, is now in 4th position. On the Yahoo search engine, we've just scratched our way to Number #3. In fact, according to Yahoo, SciFair.org is now the second most popular science fair site on the Web, behind only the Discovery Channel.

As a result, our free LABRats-Online program has just blown past 3,500 families, kids and teachers. We're now getting roughly 130 new members for the on-line program every day.

Pilot Program Launch

The LABRats pilot program will launch on or about 17 January 2006. That's when the first prototype Synergy will come together in East Greenwich, Rhode Island, and our great experiment in science teaching through building fellowship will begin. I hope to have about 30 kids in this first group. They will go through eight weeks of material, four devoted to the human body and four about Mars.

We've got lots of fun and interesting activities for the kids to do that teach great content in a wonderfully organic and integrated program. I'll be very interested to see how the kids react.

TV Show Moving Forward

Paul Gasek is a long-time producer for the Discovery Channel and a former National Geographic staffer. Paul and I have begun working together on a concept for a new television program. The program will be expand on my original effort in this arena, and focus on citizen scientists who are working to change the world. LABRats will benefit tremendously even if the show does not get on the air. More on this as things develop!

Prep For National Launch

We are already looking ahead to when we will complete the development and shakedown phases and launch the national program. In fact, I have been preparing for the national launch by laying the logistical foundation that will support the full effort. Here are a few highlights:

* Program Design: All of LABRats' structural elements—the intricate system of instruction, the parent committees, the mentor and leadership training and so on—are now completely mapped out, and the first content and activities have been written and are ready for testing.

* Content Development: So far I've recruited about a dozen content developers, and they are ready to begin writing the core course of the entire program. I've written a series of "How to write..." documents to train developers how to write the different content elements (Synergy Demonstrations, Synergy Activities, Science Skill Awards, and so on). We need to construct the complete program.

* Database Development: The database management system is already well under development. (The work is being carried out by Greg Crawford, a dedicated and highly competent volunteer. Thank you Greg!) The database system will provide Web portals for administrators, members, adult leaders, and mentors. Kids and adults all over America will be able to log on to LABRats.org (development in progress) and find Synergies near them, join LABRats, update their personal information, volunteer, download content materials, create new Synergies, take adult and mentor training courses, and manage all the administrative needs of their Synergies online. The database system should be ready for testing in the next few weeks, and it should be linked into a prototype LABRats Website shortly thereafter.

* Synergy Banking and Financial Network: I recently met with representatives of Bank of America to create a system within BofA that can provide all the online-linked services to run the entire LABRats program. Our needs will be complex. We are going to have to deliver individual bank accounts to every new Synergy and be able to automatically transfer monies between those accounts and the account of the national organization. We will also need to monitor financial transactions that the Synergies will carry out to support their local program. The folks at BofA assure me that they will be able to keep up with our demand for services no matter how fast we grow.

* Affiliate Partnerships: Our Synergies will need access to the necessary materials of science, and we will have to keep up with that demand. I've therefore established affiliate partnerships with Edmund Scientific, Wards Natural Science and Science Kit. In fact, this relationship has allowed me to open the "LABRats Supply Bureau" online through a link at www.scifair.org. Kids are using this resource already to help them with their science fair projects. These companies will produce prepackaged LABRats kits that support the programs. The National Organization will automatically transfer payment from the bank account of each individual Synergy to the appropriate company, and the companies will mail these kits directly to the Synergies. There's a lot more to report, but I don't want to drown you in details. I just wanted you to know that the LABRats community is continuing to grow, the foundation is being laid and we've started writing the first educational content.

How You Can Help

Teachers: Please tell you students about my science fair resource site, www.scifair.org. Put it on your resource sheets. Mention it in your parent-teacher conferences when the topic of science fair help comes up. Suggest to your students, especially those who like science or appear to be bored in class, that they may want to check out www.scifair.org and join the LABRats-Online program. Emphasize that the program teaches all sorts of cool, hands-on projects, that it's absolutely FREE, and that they can opt-off at anytime.

Parents: Sign your kids up for the LABRats On-Line program at www.scifair.org. When you need a science fair project, check out my "tail-kicking projects" through the SciFair.org site. And please let the LABRats Supply Bureau (also through SciFair.org) be your one-stop shopping source for all your science fair and home-based science needs. Remember, part of every dollar you spend goes to support LABRats! And if you have any questions, comments or suggestions, please don't hesitate to call me personally at 401-398-7001.