UTSAV GANDHI

campus@technewsiit.com

TechNews | Tuesday, September 10, 2013

 

MSI-IIT internship program

(continued from Page 1)

speaking and presentation skills are more
natural and confident, and my ability to adapt
my presentation depending on the needs of a
particular audience has improved, and I also
now more understand the key components of
working in a successful and motivated team. It
was a blast to interact with audiences ranging
in age from three years old to 80 years old and
seeing the same look ofwonder, awe, and fase
cination on their faces.”

“It was a combination of science,
teaching, and theater that I wouldn’t be able
to find anywhere else,” said Amy Zasadzinski,
2013 intern and second year psychology/biole
ogy double major at IIT. “This internship gave
me valuable practice in improving my people
skills, presentation skills, stage presence, and
crowd control. My favorite part of the intern,
ship . . . [was] the experience of being able to
present to hundreds of people every day and
having some of those people come up to me
and tell me things they learned from the pre
sentation and how they never knew science
could be so cool!”

Being hired for the MSI Guest Prof
grams internship is the final phase of a unique
partnership that MSI exclusively holds with
Illinois Institute of Technology. The MSIeIIT
internship partnership is now entering its 7th
year. This partnership began with a common
trustee between IIT and MSI, and the program
aims to foster communication skills in stue
dents while making science education accese
sible to the community through the delivery of
several fun and interactive live science demon,
strations at MSI.

Students apply to spend a few days
volunteering at the museum during either the
fall or spring semester of the academic year.
During this time, the accepted volunteers facile
itate smaller programs to the general museum
audience. They are coached by the lead interns
who have already completed the volunteer,
ship and internship portions of the program.
The volunteers learn two or three interactive,
handseon, and experimentebased science deme
onstrations, with topics including Newton’s
laws, sound, and electricity and magnetism.

Upon completion of 20 total volune
teer hours in a semester, the volunteers qualify
to apply for the paid summer internship, where
they learn the larger programs and work full,
time. When applying for the volunteership, fo r

mer interns offer a lot of guidance. “My advice
is to not be afraid to give it a shot,” says Trevor.
“This internship places you in situations that
may make you feel nervous and uncomforte
able, but it’s these situations that test your lime
its and help you understand your strengths and
possible areas of improvement.” Amy adds that
there are tons of reasons why the internship
could be a great fit for anyone. “If you find that
you have great connections with people . . . or
just love getting people as excited as you are
about science, do not be afraid and apply for
the internship!”

Lynne Meyer, Director of the Office
of Spiritual Life and Service Learning here at
IIT, who acts as the liaison between the mu,
seum and the university, also offers her wise
dom. She says that the MSI volunteership and
internship can be a positive and important ex,
perience for anyone, regardless of their major.
“Whatever field you go into, you’re going to
have to communicate with people who are not
in your area. Whether it’s your boss, a custom,
er, or a colleague in another department, being
able to confidently and concisely explain dif
ficult concepts to somebody who doesn’t share
your background is a real valuable skill.”

The MSI Internship Program has
become a highly competitive opportunity for
IIT students over recent years. “These seem
like really basic points, but know what you’re
applying for,” Meyer said, about those filling
out an application. “Don’t just come to an
info session, sign in, and not pay attention.
Ask questions. Also, know yourself, and know
what the opportunity really is. When filling out
the application, answer the questions. Take the
application seriously enough to think about it,
represent yourself, and sell yourself,” Meyer
added. “Take your time and think about what
you’re saying. At the same time, have fun with
it. If you’ve got a passion, let us see the pas,
sion.” There are usually over three times as
many students applying than there are spots
open for the volunteership portion of the pro,
gram, so students should also remember not
to get discouraged if they don’t get selected on
their first try. With so many passionate and
qualified applicants, it is usually very difficult
to narrow them down to the 12 who are ch07
sen to volunteer each semester. Although this
program is a very unique partnership between
MSI and IIT, one should also know there are

many other ways to volunteer
within the museum if they’d like
to have that experience. Students
are also heavily encouraged to try
again and apply in upcoming see
mesters should they not make it
on their first try.

In order to apply for the
volunteership, interested students
must attend one of three infore
mation sessions taking place next
week. The info sessions will be
held in the Hermann Hall Crown
Room from 12:30 PM. (12:30 24h)
to 1:45 PM. (13:45 24h) on Sep
tember 17, 18, and 19. For more
information, contact Lynne Meyer
at lmeyer2@iit.edu.

 

 

Photos courtesy ofIIT College ofScience

Confusion, controversy over Westboro Baptist Church rumors

Ryan Kamphuis
EDITOR-I N -CHI EF

With over 2000 members, IIT’s
Admitted Undergraduate Facebook Page has
been a hive of news, discussion, and debate
for IIT students since its inception. It was
on this page that students began an intense
debate this past week, when a student posted
that they had been informed that a member
of the Westboro Baptist Church (WB C) had
been invited to campus to give a lecture this
semester.

The Westboro Baptist Church has
existed in Topeka, Kansas since 1955. The
church began to gain notoriety in the early
1990s, however, when they began to picket
gay bars and other “dens of anonymous
homosexual activity.” The church became
a household name during the early years
of the United States’ war in Iraq when they
began picketing the funerals of soldiers
killed in Iraq, claiming that these deaths were
God’s punishment for the US. government,
“abandoning all moral imperatives.” These
funeral pickets spawned large countereprotests
and a lawsuit seeking to stop the church from
picketing funerals, arguing that the church
was a hate group. This lawsuit was eventually
heard by the Supreme Court in 2011, where

the Court voted Ste 1 that the church’s protests
were a form of protected speech under the
First Amendment of the Constitution.

Shortly after the student posted
what they had heard about the WBC lecture,
debate exploded on the Facebook page over
whether or not the lecture was a good idea.
Some students argued that by giving a member
of the Westboro Baptist Church a podium to
speak, it would appear to the public that the
university implicitly supported the church,
which could negatively affect the reputation of
the university and its students. Others argued
that the lecture could be a good wayto discover
the mindset of the WBC and its members,
and that they have the right to express and
speak their opinions. Throughout this debate,
university faculty and staff were silent, leading
to the debate becoming increasingly based
on hearsay and conjecture. Some students
eventually took it upon themselves to set up
meetings with university administration to
determine whether or not these rumors were
true; some with the intent to try to convince
the school to not hold the lecture.

It was amidst this confusion and
debate that TechNews reached out to IIT’s
Lewis College of Human Sciences and the
Office of Marketing and Communication to
determine the true story of the WB C lecture.
It was through this that TechNews had the

opportunity to speak to Jeanne Hartig, the
Vice President of the Office of Marketing and
Communication, is currently [at the time of
publication] in Seoul, South Korea for IIT’s
Annual International Alumni Association
meeting.

By interviewing D r. Hartig,
TechNews learned that Margie Phelps, WBC
leader Fred Phelps’ daughter, the lawyer who
represented the church in front of the Supreme
Court, had been invited and confirmed to
take part in a debate being held by the Lewis
College of Human Sciences as part of the
Benjamin Franklin Project. Phelps would have
been participating in a debate that was going
to focus on the issue of freedom of speech, and
Dr. Laura Beth Nielson was also confirmed to
betaking part in the debate. Nielson is a fellow
at the American Bar Foundation, the director
of the Legal Studies program at Northwestern
University, and an expert on hate speech. The
debate was going to be moderated by Professor
Steve Heyman, a professor at the IIT Chicago
Kent College of Law, and an expert on freedom
of speech issues.

TechNews has also learned that
it is true that the debate had been canceled.
“Hosting any event on campus requires that
we be certain we have what we need to make
that event successful. That may range from the
right room being available at the right time to

having the necessary staff available to manage
the operations,” said Hartig. “Given that we
have a number of events taking place in the
fall, we decided we didn’t have the right mix
for this pro gram and so we called the speakers
to tell them we decided it was better to cancel
the event.”

The point of the Benjamin Franklin
Project series, and the debate in question, is
to offer a forum for lively debate on the issues
related to our nation’s founding principles.
While the planned debate on the freedom of
speech has been canceled, Hartig expressed
her appreciation of the fact that the Facebook
posts regarding the WBC rumors became a
discussion of freedom of speech in itself. “I
was most encouraged by reading the posts
of students who understood the intended
purpose of the eventrwhich was to explore
the concept of free speech and the extent to
which we as a nation need to protect that
right...that freedom simply doesn’t exist
in many parts of the world,” said Hartig. “I
thought [the Facebook discussion] was a great
exchange of opinion.” Acknowledging the
detractors of the rumored event, Hart ig talked
about how the discussion is the very essence
of freedom of speech, “if we disagree, then it
is our responsibility to ask questions, protest
if necessary, and boycott as appropriate,”
explained Hartig.