UCLA Celebrates Brain Awareness Week

UCLA hosts an annual Brain Awareness Week in recognition of the global campaign to increase public awareness of neuroscience and the progress of brain research. The event is organized by a current NSIDP graduate student, who coordinates Project Brainstorm, an outreach group within the Brain Research Institute that makes weekly visits to low-income, low-opportunity K-12 schools all over Los Angeles to teach students about neuroscience.

This year for Brain Awareness Week, 250 5th to 12th graders visited UCLA, where they enjoyed interactive activities hosted by UCLA neuroscience undergraduate and graduate students! Participants explored fundamental neuroscience concepts, such as the different lobes of the brain, synaptic transmission and brain injury, observed sheep brain dissections to learn about parts of the brain as well as brain evolution, and learned popular neuroscience topics, such as the phantom limb syndrome, reflexes versus reaction times, the stroop effect and more! Students also visited different UCLA neuroscience laboratories, interacted with current scientists, and learned about the research process and the principles of various areas of ongoing research.

Brain Awareness Week 2016 could not have been possible without the efforts of previous coordinators, graduate students from neuroscience and other departments, undergraduates from Project Brainstorm, and members from Psych in Action, Interaxon and Project Synapse. The event has received much positive feedback from both the evaluations students filled out at the end of each day as well as verbal comments. Schools have even begun inquiring about participating in next years Brain Awareness Week!

For more information: http://neuroscience.ucla.edu/outreach

Link:
UCLA NSIDP - Neuroscience