Three Rivers Professor Awarded Grant to Run Optics Camp

Three Rivers Community College Professor Judith Donnelly received in August a grant from the International Society for Optical Engineering, or SPIE, for $3,475. Donnelly, who created the Photonics Engineering Technology program at Three Rivers in cooperation with Connecticut’s photonics and fiber optics industry, wrote the grant proposal with Donna Goyette, a physics teacher at Ellis Tech High School. The two plan to hold in spring 2007 a 3-day optics camp for high school juniors. The camp will also be supported by the NSF Funded Regional Center for Next Generation Manufacturing. Mark Kondracky, a high school physics teacher from New London High School, will also help with the camp planning and instruction. 

The camp will run on three Saturdays: April 28, May 5 and May 12. Activities include making pinhole cameras, creating holograms, using a laser engraver and engaging in optics challenges. On the third Saturday, the group will take a bus to Boston to tour the Museum of Science and the MIT Museum.

Preference is given to high school juniors attending Ellis Tech or New London High School. Registration will be open to students at other schools after March 20.