Recent outreach activities
APS Conference for Undergraduate Women and Gender Minorities in Physics (CU*iP) 2025 at NYU
NYU hosted a section of the American Physical Society CU*iP event, welcoming undergraduates women and gender minorities interested in physics to the Washington Square campus during January 24-26, 2025. Jesse Liu co-led with graduate student Ashley Argueta a parallel session roundtable for attendees to share experiences unique to being first generation or low income.
The discussions in the session were really positive, encouraging and affirming for all participants. Notably, we tackled imposter syndrome alongside feelings of an unwritten curriculum at university so common for those not from a family of academics or scientists. Having these open conversations is important to recognize unique socioeconomic issues facing those who are first in their family to attend college, as initial steps to improving retention and fostering belonging.
Teacher Programs
Led by Allen Mincer in collaboration with Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) and the National Museum of Mathematics (MoMath), we have run several programs for teachers.
In these programs we give presentations to teachers on topics related to our group's research activities.
We then work with the teachers who design lesson plans related to the subjects discussed. Our 2022 program focused on
using statistics to understand issue related to pandemics and vaccinations, as described in the BNL article titled,
"Statistics Unlock Secrets of Particles, Pandemics, and More," and was featured in DOE Science Headlines.
Previous outreach projects
Citizen Science at HiggsHunters.org
Andy Haas from NYU and Alan Barr from the University of Oxford have released higgshunters.org, the first particle physics venture on Zooniverse, and featuring real events from ATLAS.
An LHC Exhibit for the World Science Festival and USA Science & Engineering Festival
The NYU group has produced an LHC Exhibit funded by the NSF. The exhibit has been shown at the World Science Festival and USA Science & Engineering Festival.
Particle Fever Shorts: "This is Kyle Cranmer"
Public Talks: TEDx Binghamton
NYU Professor Kyle Cranmer gave a talk about the discovery of the Higgs boson at a TEDx conference held at Binghamton University on February 24th, 2013.
Higher Education and Community Involvement
NYU’s education and outreach effort focuses on students and teachers at the middle and high school level. Currently, only about a third of U.S. high-school students take physics. Experiments at the LHC have already garnered much attention in the media, and that will surely increase as the LHC turns on and physics results are obtained. This presents an excellent opportunity to bring the excitement of physics to students at a stage where interest can translate into selection of courses and, eventually, careers.
The NYU High Energy Group’s close association with the NYU Department of Teaching and Learning affords it access to a large number of urban schools. We have lectured at local middle schools and high schools, and in Department of Teaching and Learning courses. Our collaboration with Brookhaven National Laboratory's Office of Educational Programs has led to an ATLAS related component in the BNL QuarkNet program, The ATLAS Leadership Institute.
Our future plans are to develop with BNL a particle physics educational program, based on the methods we have developed and tested for the high-school level, but now specifically geared to the middle-school level. A collaboration of physicists, educational program professionals, and master teachers will develop curricular materials and present these to middle school teachers and students. As was done for the high school level program, high-energy-physics web-based conferencing tools will be used to bring students and teachers in contact with scientists at CERN and fellow students and teachers from abroad.
In the News and on TV
Kyle Cranmer and Lisa Randall are interviewed on Charlie Rose to discuss the potential of the LHC.
Attila was interviewed on Hungarian TV
US-ATLAS Involvement
Our group is actively involved in the US-ATLAS Analysis Forums. We also are very active in providing support for analysis tools in the form of tutorials and documentation. See Akira Shibata's September 15, 2008 article in ATLAS News: [article].
Higgs Boson: A Natural Disaster!
"My Story in the Higgs Discovery" Physics Slam on Ice
Nifty Fifty
StarTalk With Neil deGrasse Tyson
Kyle Cranmer joins Bill Nye the Science Guy, Eugene Mirman and Sara Vowell on Neil deGrasse Tyson's StarTalk Live for a special episode dedicated to the Higgs discovery. Voted fan favorite for 2012. [Part 1] and [Part 2]
