As a new school year begins, the University of Iowa is providing a host of educational and entertaining activities to engage new and current Hawkeyes arriving on campus.
Trashcano
For anyone who likes blowing stuff up (and, really, who doesn’t?), a group of first-year students enrolled in the UI’s Honors Primetime program will study volcanic eruptions through staged, simulated demonstrations.
Divided into groups, the students will load drums with liquid nitrogen, water, and various projectiles (golf balls, tennis balls, Nerf balls) to simulate the physical processes that occur during a volcanic eruption. The events will take place beginning at 1 p.m. Aug. 14 and continue on Aug. 15. The UI community is invited to watch the eruptions, which climb 50 feet in the air.
While the eruptions make for great home-brewed entertainment, the activity, for which students earn class credit, is science-based.
“They’re understanding the mechanics of an eruption on this small scale that’s safe and fun and that they can extrapolate it to a basic Earth process like volcanoes,” says Ingrid Ukstins, associate professor in the UI Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the course instructor. “This is to me what science is all about.”
Student composting
Yearning to be a good steward of the environment? The UI Office of Sustainability will make available compost bins for students who want to recycle their food waste and keep those leftovers out of a landfill.
More than 1,000 individual compost bins will be available to first-year students and others who live in residence halls at the Office of Sustainability’s open house, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Aug. 15–17, in the University Capitol Centre.
Composting is an extension of pilot efforts over the last three years in various residence halls.
Students who participate in the expanded initiative, funded by UI Student Government, will be able to drop off their compost at Burge, Catlett or Hillcrest residence halls. From there, University Housing and Dining makes sure the foodstuff gets to the industrial composting facility in Iowa City, where it’s turned into “black gold”—perfect for replenishing soil in gardens and on Iowa farms.
Beth MacKenzie, recycling coordinator in the Office of Sustainability, says the initiative benefits students and the university equally.
“It helps us divert more waste from a landfill, which helps the UI meets its 2020 sustainability goals,” she says. “And, it allows our students to be more involved in sustainability initiatives on campus and teaches them how to compost as well.”
If you miss the open house, don’t fret: Remaining bins will be available in the Burge, Catlett, and Hillcrest residence halls during the first two weeks of September.
Engineering scavenger hunt
Undergraduate students will get to play detective in a virtual quest to learn how to make the perfect cup of coffee in an augmented-reality scavenger hunt created by the staff at the Lichtenberger Engineering Library.
The Engineering Library Scavenger Hunt will take place Aug. 16 during the College of Engineering tour phase of orientation activities. It will continue also during the first two weeks of classes.
Using an avatar named Detective Jones as the guide, students will follow clues to locate a book in the library’s stacks, learn about a 3-D scanner on the library premises, search for an online story about prime coffee-brewing temperatures, and check out a thermal imaging camera—one of 184 tools, such as GoPro cameras and air and water sensors, made available by the library for student use.
Once students complete the hunt, they can visit head librarian Kari Kozak for a prize: The first 100 students to finish the challenge receive a 16-ounce travel coffee mug.
“Our main goal is to have a fun, interactive way to teach students about the Lichtenberger Engineering Library and all that we have here,” Kozak says.
Introducing performing arts at Hancher
Hancher Auditorium, which brings world-famous artists and performances to Iowa City, will host a Hancher is for Hawkeyes open house from 2:30 to 5:30 p.m. Aug. 23 to welcome students and acquaint them with the newly built venue that is a campus cultural hub.
The Hancher building was destroyed in the flood of 2008, and its events were dispersed to locales across the community as a new facility was designed and built. The new Hancher opened in fall 2016, and the open house will showcase the performing arts center to students who may not have seen it.
“We’ve had two generations of UI students who haven’t had a Hancher facility,” says Rob Cline, Hancher’s director of marketing and communications. “There’s not as much institutional knowledge among students of what that big, shiny building along the river really is. This is a way to introduce ourselves to them.”
The event will feature tours of the building—including peeks onstage and backstage—drawings for free Hancher tickets, and special student ticket prices as low as $5 for many performances.
“We’re well aware that some of the artists on the schedule aren’t household names, so we want to encourage students to take a chance on something or someone they may not know much about,” Cline says.