Fans of Sheldon Cooper – a fictional character in The Big Bang Theory TV series – would have been enthralled by a special visitor to Bayside P-12 College.
Astrophysicist and Nobel Prize winner Brian Schmidt recently visited the Williamstown campus as part of the school’s prize for winning last year’s Big Science Competition.
Professor Schmidt is patron of Australian Science Innovations, a not-for-profit organisation that runs the international competition and aims to inspire students in science.
Bayside was one of 570 schools to enter the competition, which tests critical thinking and problem-solving skills.
Professor Schmidt shared the 2006 Shaw Prize in Astronomy and 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics with Saul Perlmutter and Adam Riess for providing evidence that the expansion of the universe is accelerating.
Bayside community and international program co-ordinator Tracey James said
Professor Schmidt had students in the palm of his hands.
“Our senior physics students didn’t want to leave after their session and ended up staying through the year 7 session, too,” she said.
“We were supposed to break at recess but I think by the time Professor Schmidt had finished fielding questions there was only about five minutes of recess left.
“The students learnt a lot as Professor Schmidt fielded questions on string versus particle theory, dark matter, Hadron colliders, black holes, and careers in science.
“It was enough to turn anyone into a budding Sheldon Cooper and the students just loved it.”
Goya Dmytryshchak
