Undergraduates Deliver: Employment in Science Education

October 28, 2025
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Parmida Miri and Chloe Lawson, Phenomenal Physics summer camps, 2025

Science education is the foundation of our Department’s Outreach Programming, and our Phenomenal Physics & Astronomy camps program is no exception. Camps provide a unique summer employment opportunity for undergraduate students interested in exploring science education and instructing. We asked 2025 summer camp instructors, Parmida Miri and Chloe Lawson, about their experiences as instructors and how this has added to their science degree experience.

History

The Department of Physics and astronomy outreach program has run physics and astronomy summer camps since 1995. This program enlists undergraduate instructors to provide a range of fun and challenging physics and astronomy activities for youth ages 7-14, including lessons in designing, building, testing and discovering fundamental science skills, and exploring kid-friendly physics, astronomy and engineering science education. 

For campers, summer camps provide an opportunity for youth to practice science and explore their interests with staff and other student mentors. Accessible to all levels, camps are geared towards stimulating students who have a love for science. 

In this history of these camps, we’ve had campers bring their love of science to UBC from elementary and high school and be admitted into our [university] programs”, mentions Andrzej Kotlicki, Director of PHAS Outreach, “it’s important that we preserve the level of science we offer, and support youth who are interested in more challenging science education.”

Pedagogically, camps have been built to engage youth in science: instructors offer hands-on discovery activities with games, practice labs, group projects, and celebrate all young scientists in their science discovery and learning. With a focus on teaching fundamental skills from asking questions to measuring, testing and reporting on results, we aspire to gives youth the building blocks on how to be a scientist, and to show through doing that learning Physics and astronomy involves a lot of creativity, fun and attention to details.

Each year we hire two undergraduate students to run four camps over the month of July. 2025 Summer instructors, PHAS undergrads Parmida Miria and Chloe Lawson, were keen to share some thoughts and highlights on how this experience has added to their higher education. 

Parmida Miri

“Teaching physics to grades 1–4 kids in the Fun with Physics camps was a great experience for me as a physicist because it reminded me how the human brain actually learns concepts in math and physics. One major realization was that in my own studies I’ve often tried to master all the math first, before I could really see the big picture. But through teaching the kids, I started to better understand what my profs have meant when they say physicists often know the answer first and then spend the rest of their lives figuring out the math behind it. 

With kids, it always works better to start from something familiar: if you want to explain electricity, you begin with what it does—turning on a light, powering things they recognize—and only after that is it meaningful to talk about electrons moving in a circuit. Of course, historically electricity was discovered before there were light bulbs, but sometimes it’s easier to flip the history upside down if the right-side-up version is too abstract to imagine.

Another thing I learned is that physics is often best understood by struggling with questions rather than passively reading a long 40-page chapter. Reading is important, but your “inner kid” really does start doodling in the margins by page 20 unless you’ve had a chance to wrestle with the ideas yourself. “

Chloe Lawson

“The job offered a great deal of freedom in terms of what I chose to contribute to the ever-growing inventory of lessons and activities for summer camps. Using the already constructed lesson plans and lesson framework as a jumping off point, I was given the choice to design new activities, building off old ones as well as using preexisting lessons to construct the camp schedules. I took this opportunity to learn new skills such as CAD, 3D printing and using a variety of other tools/machines. I was also able to strengthen other skills such as building circuits. 

Another opportunity that the job presented me was improving my public speaking and presenting skills. As I’m sure many physicists feel, public speaking is something that definitely does not come naturally to me. As a camp instructor I was able to practice and hone this skill amidst comfortable topics and an unintimidating audience. 

I think one of the most important things in physics and science as a whole is being able to share it with a broad audience. I learned so much during the job and through explaining things to kids about how different people process and understand things.”

Parmida and Chloe are both active in other PHAS Outreach programs (Home Page | UBC Physics & Astronomy Outreach), including Girls & STEAM, Physics Circle, Youth outreach education, the Physics Olympics and the Faraday Show. 

For students interested in honing their skills in science education and communication through our programs, please contact outreach@phas.ubc.ca.

 

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