Past Winners

Jacqueline Cofield
Former physics and chemistry schoolteacher, author, and social entrepreneur, Jacqueline Cofield is the founder of J Rȇve International, LLC. Her enterprise targets enhanced learning through STEAM and arts integration, and cross-cultural experiential education. Jacqueline specializes in creating game-changing experiences for educators, students, artists and arts patrons. Her unique programs are designed to bridge cultural and global barriers to humanity, creativity, academic performance, and productivity. She published ‘STEAM+ Arts Integration’ and launched its corresponding conference. An international ambassador, Cofield collaborates globally with leading cultural and educational institutions, visionaries in creative arts and education, and private enterprises. She is also a trilingual multidisciplinary cultural strategist and has lived and studied in 9 countries and traveled to more than 60. Cofield graduated with multiple honors degrees in Education, Communication, and Fine Arts respectively from the City University of New York, University of Southern California, and Tisch School for the Arts at New York University.

Diane Noel
Diane Noel has been working with the State of Connecticut Public Health Laboratory (CTDPHL) for over fifteen years and currently serves as Supervisor of the Enterics and Bioterrorism Response departments. During her tenure, her and her team has processed and tested thousands of samples implicated in criminal cases of bioterrorism threats, including the Amerithrax attack in the fall of 2001. She continues her role in educating clinical laboratorians on improving their capacity in identifying potential dangerous pathogens while they are on the bench, as well as increasing outreach to First Responders and other key players (i.e. state and federal agencies) to demonstrate the evolving responsibilities of the Public Health Laboratory as new biological threats emerge. Prior to her work at CTDPHL, she had over twenty years working as a clinical microbiology supervisor at both the hospital and reference clinical laboratory level.

Daniel McKinney
Daniel McKinney is a passionate science educator with over 16 years of classroom experience teaching a broad spectrum of subjects including Physics, Biology, Astronomy, Marine Biology, and Agriculture. He also has over a decade of experience as a professional development designer and facilitator working primarily in beginning teacher mentoring and science instructional design. He is currently employed at Santa Rosa Academy in Menifee, California where he teaches Physics, Astronomy, and Environmental Science. He also develops workshops with the California Science Project at the University of California Riverside that integrate modern physics research into contemporary physics classrooms. Doctor McKinney focuses on dynamic hands-on instruction and active engagement to make science and critical thinking real and lifelong practices for his students. It is his sincere belief that education remains the most powerful and empowering resource a person can possess and is an effective means of promoting positive social change.

Ashlie Blackstone Smith
Ashlie Smith instructs physical science at Cranbrook Kingswood Middle School for Girls located in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. An early adopter of educational technology and facilitative learning, Smith counts “flipping her classroom” as one of her top achievements. For this effort, she was recognized by TechSmith Corporation as Screencast Champion and awarded the honor of “exemplary teacher” by the Cranbrook Educational Community. Smith uses space science to encourage her students to dream big and cites inspiring young girls to develop an interest in STEM and consider STEM careers as driving passions. In 2016, Smith was honored to present a TEDx talk titled “Inspiring the Astronauts of Tomorrow.” She was the recipient of the 2017 Alan Shepard Technology in Education Award presented by NASA, Astronaut Memorial Foundation, and Space Foundation. In addition to instruction, Smith chairs an innovation committee charged with furthering a relationship between Cranbrook and the MIT Edgerton Center.

Dwight Bates
Dwight Lee Bates PE is an Engineer with 44 years experience in the Aviation, Shipbuilding and Automotive fields and 200 awards. His current project is as an Engineering Fellow in the South Central Washington STEM Network. He goes to schools helping the students to do STEM Engineering projects he developed. He flies kids in a light airplane to convince them in becoming Engineers and pilots. He wrote and published his own book for the students entitled; “Due Diligence – Memoirs of the Life of An Engineer and Outdoorsman.” Lee was a Material Review Board Liaison Engineer in the Boeing factories designing, building and repairing Boeing jetliners from the 747 to the 787. He was an expert Engineer GS 13 overhauling US Navy ships for the US Department of Defense. He is a Licensed Mechanical Engineer, a Private Pilot, BSME and MBA Degrees. He built and flew his own Light Sport Aircraft.

Jeff Nosanov
Prior to founding V-Sense Medical Devices, Inc. in 2015, Mr. Nosanov led multiple project and proposal management activities at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laborator. He managed projects ranging from technology development to mission design, and led proposal efforts between $50,000 and $500,000,000. He has represented federal labs before NASA, DARPA and other agencies, and has represented a NASA program at the United Nations in Vienna, Austria. He has led several previous business endeavors ranging from IT services to aerospace industry consulting.
Mr. Nosanov earned a J.D. and became the first person in the United States to earn an LL.M. degree in space and telecommunications law. He has also been selected for the prestigious NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts three times, leading advanced space mission and technology design projects. His volunteer activities are highlighted by frequent visits to primary schools to talk with children about space exploration, science, and technology. Additionally, he is a frequent writer on Quora.com and top writer in the space area for the last few years with about 400,000 answer views, and published in Forbes.

Rhett Alain
Rhett Allain is currently an Associate Professor of Physics at Southeastern Louisiana University and blogger at Wired. Early in high school, he realized that he liked science and decided to study physics. During graduate school, Allain realized that he enjoyed teaching physics because only by teaching do you really start to learn physics. In 2008 he started to write blog posts analyzing fun things in physics as a way to show students how to complete small research projects. After just a couple of posts, he became addicted to blogging and has continued writing about things that don’t matter ever since. His favorite topics are estimations and the physics of science fiction. Rhett is currently the science advisor for The MythBusters as well as MacGyver and The Science of Stupid. In his spare time he enjoys taking things apart, but he usually can’t put them back together.

Jess Phoenix
Jess Phoenix is Executive Director and co-founder of revolutionary environmental scientific research organization Blueprint Earth. She is a volcanologist, an extreme explorer, and a professional field scientist. She has been chased by narco-traffickers in Mexico, dodged armed thieves in remote Peru, raced horses across Mongolia, worked on the world’s largest volcano in Hawaii, piloted the Jason2 submersible on an undersea volcano, and explored deep in the Australian Outback. Jess believes science should be accessible to everyone, and that creative possibility is limitless. Jess is a Fellow in The Explorers Club, a featured scientist on the Discovery and Science Channels, an invited TEDx speaker, and she has appeared in Popular Science magazine, on National Public Radio, on CNN, NBC, and more. She has delivered talks at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles, and at many colleges and universities, and has carried the official Explorers Club Flag on a research expedition.

Guy Chriqui
Guy Chriqui is a Senior Research Engineer at Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Technology Center. His work specializes in opto-mechanical systems design and development. Guy’s current projects include the Segmented Planar Imaging Detector for Electro-optical Reconnaissance (SPIDER), a Photonic Integrated Circuit based imaging system. Guy and the lab where his SPIDER telescope is being developed will be featured in the Generation Beyond Virtual Field Trip during World Space Week, on Tuesday, October 4th at 1pm ET. Before coming to Lockheed Martin, Guy’s career path included time at Boeing, NASA, and Moon Express. His previous projects saw him leading teams to develop Lunar Micro Rovers in an effort to make a COTS rover a reality. Guy received his Masters of Science in Astronautics from the University of Southern California and his Bachelors of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. Outside of work, Guy is an active mentor for students in robotics. His teams have won multiple world championships and over 50 regional titles as well as many design awards. This led to including him as a robotics advisor for Disney’s Big Hero Six.

Mary Lou Jepsen
Dr. Mary Lou Jepsen is the founder of Openwater whose goal is a wearable with MRI-plus resolution that can enable telepathy as well as drastically transform diagnostic costs for healthcare. Previously she was an engineering executive at Facebook, Oculus, Google[x] and Intel. In addition, Mary Lou has founded 4 startups including One Laptop per Child where she was CTO, chief architect and delivered to mass production the $100 laptop. Her startup CEO experience includes the world’s only fabless display screen company which was based in Taipei. She has been a professor at both MITs: RMIT in Australia and MIT in Cambridge. She is an inventor on well over 100 published or issued patents and has shipped billions of dollars worth of consumer electronics on the hairy edge of what the physics will do. She has been recognized with many awards including TIME magazine’s “Time 100” as one of the 100 most influential people in the world and as a CNN top 10 thinker.

Tara Chklovski
Tara is the CEO and founder of the global non-profit Iridescent. Her mission in life has been to transform the opportunities available to young people, especially girls, to reach their full-potential and impact their communities. Tara founded Iridescent in 2006 to create and deliver powerful science, engineering, and technology education to empower underrepresented young people. Iridescent has since grown to a community of over 3,500 mentors and more than 63,000 participants throughout the world through its flagship programs Technovation and Curiosity Machine. Forbes highlighted Tara in 2016 as “the pioneer empowering the incredible tech girls of the future” and she was prominently featured in the award-winning documentary Codegirl. Tara earned her BS in Physics from St. Stephen’s College and a MS in aerospace engineering from Boston University. Tara left her PhD program in aerospace engineering at USC to pursue her social entrepreneurship to found Iridescent and directly empower girls and children everywhere.

MacCalvin Romain
MacCalvin is a Boston native currently earning his Masters in Business Administration from the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. After earning a Bachelors of Science in Management and Information Systems from Boston College, MacCalvin worked as a IT Consultant at EMC and as a Managing Business Technologist at DigistasLBI. In 2012 while at DigitasLBI, MacCalvin formed a partnership with Citizens School, a non-profit organization whose mission is to close the opportunity gap for middle schoolers in low-income communities by creating after-school programs that extend the learning day. Looking to blend his passion for technology and innovation with his passion for giving back to his community, MacCalvin recruited members of the Digitas team and launched an after-school curriculum that has brought technology and marketing-based courses to over 250 students in the Boston public school system. Outside of his studies, MacCalvin serves on the Citizen Schools Leadership Council, Massachusetts STEM council, TEDxBoston leadership team, and is the Director of the Wolverine Venture Fund at the University of Michigan.

Dawn Thompson
Dawn Thompson met her husband, Punkin Chunkin cofounder Bill Thompson, in 1988, and she’s been a diehard Chunker ever since. Dawn has been there for every major Punkin Chunkin moment, from the first centrifugal machine to the first (and only) spectator to be hit by a punkin; she even co-wrote a ballad about the Chunk’s origins (performed at every championship since 1989). In her spare time, Dawn inspires future engineers by doing mini trebuchet demonstrations at local schools. When asked about her amateur engineering accomplishments, Dawn merely says, “I’m pretty good at the mechanical stuff.” ‘Pretty good’ is an understatement coming from the first woman to ever earn a Championship Punkin Chunkin title, a feat achieved with her winning air cannon Hormone Blaster on the event’s 25th Anniversary. Dawn’s desire to share her passions for mechanics, innovation, and creativity makes her a Science Super Hero to backyard engineers everywhere.

Samuel O’Dell
Samuel O’Dell is a Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at Roane State Community College, where he is in the midst of faculty who are truly dedicated to teaching and making a difference in their students’ lives. He tries to model his teaching after my father and the great faculty in Science Education at the University of Georgia, where he earned his PhD. He doesn’t have to look any further than my students to find science superheroes; many of them have families, full time jobs, struggle with financial resources, or all of the above. Yet they persevere in order to get into professions that help others, and he is proud to be amongst them. To anyone reading this, he thanks you for your interest in science and science education. You make the world a better place.

Michael Weiss
Michael Weiss is an American engineer who is known for his contributions to on-orbit satellite servicing missions, particular of the Hubble Space Telescope. Weiss most recently served as deputy program director on the Hubble Space Telescope program at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt,MD. Weiss received his B.S. and M.S. in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Maryland College Park in 1978 and 1983. He has led the systems engineering for missions including the systems engineering for missions including the Solar Maximum Mission, Upper Atmosphere Research Satelite, the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory and Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer as well as the first shuttle based satellite repair, the Solar Maximum Repair Mission in 1984. Weiss was involved in all 5 Hubble Space Telescope servicing missions. He directed systems development during servicing mission 1 and servicing mission 2. He served as deputy program director through servicing mission 4. He also led the Mishap Investigation Board investigating the failure of a balloon launch from Australia carrying a gamma-ray telescope for to the University of California at Berkeley.

Jordan Kruger
Jordan Kruger is the STEM Director and Assistant Principal of ITW David Speer Academy, a new STEM high school in Chicago, IL. He was born and raised in Chicago and is passionate about improving science education and has been for the past 11 years as a teacher and as a high school administrator. After graduating from the University of Illinois (where he also was a a part of the Fighting Illini football team), he entered Teach For America and taught science at an inner-city high school in Chicago. Since that time he has taught Physics, Biology, AP Biology, Chemistry and now as a high school administrator he works to create a curriculum focused on empowering inner-city students to succeed in STEM in college and beyond. His goal is to create over 1000 minority STEM professionals by 2026 by developing strong science curricula and STEM outreach programming.

Mark Ferraro
“Every day is Earth Day!” Mark Ferraro’s students are greeted by this phrase as they enter the classroom. He studied Horticulture, Earth and Space Science, Environmental Science and learned how to be an administrator at Temple University. As a science educator for the past 19 years, Mark loves “getting his hands dirty” by incorporating real world experiences into his classes. He has helped introduce hydroponics and aquaponics to the LEED certified Lower Merion School District that has always been very supportive of sustainability initiatives. Mark has guided the district wide Green Council which searches for ways to decrease our ecological footprint. When he’s not in the classroom, you can find Mark standing in a creek or hiking in a forest. He is passionate about our planet!

Major Hope Klukovich
Maj Hope M. Klukovich is currently assigned to United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) as the Director of Faculty Research/Assistant Professor for the Department of Chemistry. Maj Klukovich attended Officer Training School at Maxwell AFB, AL, and commissioned in 2004. Her first assignment was to the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) at Wright Patterson AFB, OH where she worked as a fuels chemist. Her next assignment was to USAFA as an instructor of chemistry. Following her assignment at USAFA, Maj Klukovich attended Duke where she was awarded a doctorate in chemistry. Next Maj Klukovich was assigned to the Rocket Propulsion Division of AFRL at Edwards AFB, CA in 2012. In 2014-2015, Maj Klukovich was the Chief of the Air Force Petroleum Agency’s lab at Al Udeid AB, Qatar. She was also a metal finishing chemist and water treatment chemist prior to her military service

Adam Lazarus
Adam teaches 7th grade Life Science in Watts, Los Angeles. Obsessed with insects since birth,he has spent a lifetime exploring how tiny creatures give us big ideas. This is especially helpful in urban settings, where it’s easy to lose touch with the environment we depend on. He deploys his substantial bug zoo to help rebuild that connection. “You can’t ask someone to protect what they don’t love, and you can’t ask someone to love what they don’t know,” says Adam. “Bugs are a means to give students ownership over some small piece of nature, and this fosters a sense of responsibility for the world at large.” Adam’s work on insects –primarily ants- has led to collaborations with Harvard, Duke, Stanford, and NASA Astrobiology- the search for extraterrestrial life. His tales of the people he has met while looking for bugs have brought him to the TEDx stage, and served as the basis for Bug Bites, a kids science show he hosts on PBS and KCET.

Jonathan Mullen
Jon Mullen was born in Nepal, adopted into an American Family as an infant, and then managed to grow up all over the world until age 15. Being homeschooled, he had plenty of time to spend exploring the planet around him. He maintains his deep passion for science.Jon began his teaching career in South America. Then it was on to Tennessee, Georgia, and North Carolina, where he is the Science Lab teacher for 700 kids aged 5-10. Jon wants his students to experience a sense of awe each time they leave his classroom. He wants them to understand their grave responsibility to take care of our world. He wants them to ask questions, and to think critically. “If they’re not talking about science class at the dinner table, I haven’t done my job,” he says.Ask him and he’ll tell you he has the best job on the planet.

Alexandra Kuechenberg
Alexandra Kuechenberg is an interdisciplinary artist, technologist, and Creative Director at the Frost Science Museum. Her projects are built around emerging interactive media technologies and are driven by her fascination with human perception. From 2006-2012 Alexandra led the design and development of numerous artworks for renowned light and space artist James Turrell. Her work for Turrell inspired her to explore alternate avenues of communicating the wonders of perception to wide audiences. In 2012 she founded the creative studio TO:SEE, a Miami based research and design practice. TO:SEE’s mission is to facilitate collaborative development of non-invasive technologies that facilitate authentic human and environmental connection. Since 2013, she has been building programs, exhibits and experiences for Miami’s new Frost Science Museum, set to open in Spring 2017. Alexandra holds a terminal degree in creative technology from NYU’s Interactive Technology Program and uses light as a jump rope.

Douglas Robinson
Douglas Robinson is a cell biologist who investigates how cells control their shapes for normal human health. His lab initially uses a model organism Dictyostelium to discover fundamental concepts and then applies these insights to human diseases, including cancer and lung disease. Doug’s lab has also built an outreach initiative for high school students from economically and educationally disadvantaged backgrounds. Based on the success of the high school program, Doug and his colleagues then created a pipeline effort called the Johns Hopkins Initiative for Careers in Science and Medicine (CSM). So far, CSM has served over 100 students from high school through postbaccalaureate levels. 100% of the high schoolers have matriculated into 4-year colleges, and some of the first group of postbaccalaureate students were just accepted into MD and MD/PhD programs. CSM’s overarching goal is to create opportunity for scholars to achieve success independent of socioeconomic background.

Debbie Sterling
Debbie Sterling is the Founder and CEO of GoldieBlox, the award-winning children’s multimedia company disrupting the pink aisle in toy stores globally and challenging gender stereotypes with the world’s first girl engineer character. Debbie is an engineer, entrepreneur, and one of the leaders in the movement toward empowering girls to build their confidence, dreams and ultimately, their futures. She was named TIME’s “Person of the Moment,” honored by the National Retail Foundation as one of 25 “People Shaping Retail’s Future,” and was recently added to Fortune Magazine’s prestigious “40 Under 40” list. In 2015, Debbie was inducted as a Presidential Ambassador for Global Entrepreneurship and honored by the National Women’s History Museum with a “Living Legacy” Award for her work to empower girls around the world. Debbie received her degree in Engineering at Stanford University in 2005.

Olivia Pavco-Giaccia
Olivia Pavco-Giaccia focuses on the synergies between science, entrepreneurship, and girl-centric activism that impact both local and national dialogs. Her first book Ava & The Copper Key was awarded a Gold Medal by Moonbeam Children’s Book Awards. She is the founder and CEO of the social venture, LabCandy, while also finishing her degree in Cognitive Science from Yale University. Oliva was selected as the youngest-ever Fellow at Yale’s Entrepreneurial Institute. She led LabCandy’s highly successful Kickstarter campaign that met its entire funding goal in only three days. LabCandy’s brightly colored lab coats, kid-sized sparkly lab goggles, and science adventure storybooks are enjoyed by kids around the world. She has collaborated with a variety of STEM-focused initiatives including Imagine magazine and the Women’s Leadership Initiative, while serving on the Champions Board of the National Girls Collaborative Project, the country’s largest non-profit organization committed to girls in STEM.

Livia Eberlin, Ph. D
Livia S. Eberlin is an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at the University of Texas at Austin. Originally from Brazil, she moved to the USA in 2008 to pursue her PhD in Analytical Chemistry at Purdue University. During her PhD, she developed mass spectrometry imaging to human cancer diagnosis and surgical margin evaluation. In recognition of her innovative work, she received several awards including the Nobel Laureate Signature Award from the American Chemical Society. In 2012, she started her postdoctoral work at Stanford University. During that period, she received the L’Oréal for Women in Science Fellowship, a K99 pathway to independence award from the NIH, and was listed in the Forbes 30 under 30 list in Science and Healthcare. In 2016, Dr. Eberlin joined the University of Texas at Austin. She is passionate about research at the interface of chemistry and medicine. Her research group is focused on developing innovative chemical technologies to address critical problems in health-related research.

Nazli Azimi, Ph.D.
Dr. Nazli Azimi is Co-founder and CEO of Bioniz Therapeutics, as well as the co-inventor of its core-technology. As both a noted researcher and a seasoned business professional, Dr. Azimi’s vision and passion for the future of immune therapeutics have driven Bioniz’s core technology from a hypothesis shared with her co-founder, to a fully realized platform technology that is best recommended by the world class business leaders. Dr. Azimi originally graduated from the University of Tehran with a doctorate in pharmacology, from which she went on to a post-doctorate immunology program at one of the premier research groups at the NIH directed by Dr. Thomas Waldmann, a pioneer in the field of immune-therapy. During her post-doctoral studies, Dr. Azimi made seminal contributions to the discovery and characterization of interleukin 15, a critical immune system protein. After the NIH, Dr. Azimi joined the faculty at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center where she studied immune cytokine responses to herpes and other viruses before transitioning into entrepreneurship. Before founding Bioniz, Dr. Azimi demonstrated her talent for translational science and leadership as Founder and CEO of Dermaheal USA a privately held company which was acquired in 2014 after 7 years of successful operation. Fitting into Dr. Azimi’s expansive knack for diverse thought, she is also a trained artist whose paintings were exhibited when she lived in Washington, DC.

Beth Topinka
STEAM Lab Teacher, Millstone Elementary, Central NJ. Do Madagascar hissing cockroaches prefer the scent of peppermint over vanilla? Can you design a mountainside motel for a mouse? How about create safe transport for a 2,000-year-old fossil? This is what happens in Beth Topinka’s S.T.E.A.M. lab at the Millstone Township School District in central New Jersey. Beth also runs the Community Problem Solvers club that recently won first place in the New Jersey Future Problem Solving State Bowl. Looking to solve the problem of the spread of an invasive species, Beth’s students developed a solution to keep seeds from sticking to shoes and clothes. The Phearlessly Phighting Phragmites project team heads to the International Conference in Wisconsin in June.
Beth’s teaching philosophy is to engage students with their community to collaborate on authentic problems. She’s a vocal advocate for interdisciplinary, problem-based learning. In 2016 she was selected to be a Science Friday Educator Collaborator, as well as a state finalist for the Presidential Awards for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching. After graduating from Ashland University in Ohio and completing a master’s degree at The Ohio State University, Beth earned her teaching certification from Georgian Court University in New Jersey. She taught middle school science for 12 years, earning a Gifted Education Certificate from Rutgers along the way. She moved to Millstone’s elementary school to develop a NGSS-based STEAM program. WSF Program—The Ultimate Science Day: Visitors to Beth’s “What’s Shakin’?!” activity choose among three different structural engineering design challenges. How will your structural solutions protect precious artifacts from the terrifying earthquake encountered on our mighty, bicycle-powered shake table? Yes, you get to ride the bike!

Dr. Valerie Camille Jones
Math Teacher, Ron Clark Academy, Atlanta, Georgia. Dancing their way through geometry and algebra is what earned Camille Jones the reputation as her students’ favorite teacher…and the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching and recognition by Congressman John Lewis. Frequently dressed as a Poké Ball and teaching in a classroom that looks like it’s straight from the set of Willie Wonka, Camille uses real-life applications to teach her middle school in Southeast Atlanta that math is part of everything from architecture to basketball and more. Dr. Jones earned her bachelor’s degree in Mathematics at Spelman College and continued her studies by earning master’s and doctoral degrees in Mathematics Education from Georgia State University and Columbia University respectively. Dr. Jones is national board certified and also a certified industry studio teacher. She is greatly respected for her creative approach in making the most difficult topics tangible to her students. Dr. Jones teaches her students how to effectively use mathematical models as communication tools. In the classroom, she develops art and video game simulations to connect students to math and coordinates field trips to provide real-life examples of the influence of math. WSF Program—Cool Jobs: Glow-in-the-dark sticks, dancing, geometric shapes will entrance the audience in how Jones teachers math in her class.

Joshua Winter
Physics Teacher, Basis Independent Brooklyn School. It’s hard not to love your physics teacher when he has a fellow teacher smash a cinderblock on his chest with a sledgehammer to demonstrate inertia and mass. Leaving his home state of Mississippi and teaching university physics, Joshua headed to Brooklyn to show that even 11-year-olds can grapple physics.Joshua Winter has been teaching physics for over 15 years to students of all age levels. Whether kindergartners or college students, his engaging teaching style, and exciting demonstrations make even the most complex concepts accessible. Winter is the recipient of numerous excellence in teaching awards including the Herb Handley Outstanding New Science Teacher Award from the Mississippi Science Teacher’s Association and the Faculty Teaching Award in Natural & Physical Sciences and Math & Statistics from the Mississippi State University. For his series on the Physics of Football, he won the GOLD Award for Excellence in Broadcasting from the Mississippi Association of Broadcasters. Winter is also a musician in a local rock band and enjoys hiking and traveling with his wife and two pups.

Jocelyn Duff
Jocelyn Duff is the Founder and Executive Director of CureCMT4J, an all-volunteer, non-profit foundation inspired by her 11 year-old daughter, Talia. In 2015 Talia was diagnosed with CMT4J, a rare disease, similar to ALS, known to affect approximately 22 people worldwide. CMT4J is a life-threatening, neuro-degenerative disease that causes progressive muscle weakness, leading to paralysis and respiratory compromise. Jocelyn founded CureCMT4J in June, 2016 to address an expedited path toward a cure. She quickly formed a scientific team of world-experts who began pre-clinical work in October, 2016 at Jackson Laboratories, through a grant from the NIH. In December, 2016 CureCMT4J funded the first-ever viral vector production for CMT4J through the UNC-Chapel Hill. Duff expects “proof of concept” results as early as June, 2017. CureCMT4J’s goal is to reach a small clinical trial as quickly as possible to save Talia and others afflicted with CMT4J. “We have the science. Now we need the funding.” To learn more about CMT4J or to donate towards a cure go to: curecmt4j.org.

Matt Sloane
Matt Sloane is the CEO of Skyfire Consulting, and it’s parent company, Atlanta Drone Group. Through his work with fire and police departments around the country, he has helped these agencies incorporate cutting edge drone technology into their arsenal of life-saving technology. From giving firefighters critical information about active fires, to giving police officers real-time intelligence on hostage takers, these machines are saving lives daily. Matt and his team are also using this technology for national news networks during severe weather outbreaks to help warn viewers about the dangers of natural disasters.

Robert Jett
Robert Jett is a Co-Founder and current Board Member for TeCanal, Inc., a nonprofit organization operating in and around Baltimore, Maryland. TeCanal aims to build interest and proficiency in STEM-related fields by providing low-income communities with both technological resources (like laptops, computers, etc.) and in-person educational programs led by high school volunteers. TeCanal is an organization driven by a belief that all people should be given the chance to participate in a world that is becoming more and more dominated by science and technology. In the two years since its founding, TeCanal has grown to include an after-school program and an immigrant and refugee center – and several expansions are planned for the coming months. Robert is currently a freshman at Yale University, where, although undecided in major, he plans to continue to investigate how educational opportunities can be made more free and accessible for people not only in Maryland but around the world.

Leland Melvin
Leland Melvin was 25 feet under water in a 6 Million gallon pool training to perform space walks as an American Astronaut when he called the test director and asked him to turn the volume up in his headset. He never heard a reply and was immediately hoisted out of the pool to learn that he was totally deaf. Emergency surgery and partial recovery led him to being medically disqualified by NASA flight surgeons to fly in space, ever. Hear his fascinating story of perseverance and how he traveled off-planet on two Space Shuttle Missions to help build the International Space Station. Before becoming an astronaut Leland was Selected in the 1986 College draft to play professional football with the Detroit Lions but a hamstring injury thwarted his NFL career at both Detroit and then as a free agent with the Dallas Cowboys. Leland is the only person to catch a pass in the National Football League and in space. The Pro Football Hall of Fame thought it appropriate to place his Detroit Lions jersey under glass in Canton, Ohio honoring his athletic and academic pursuits. Leland has degrees in Chemistry and Materials Science Engineering and worked at NASA Langley Research Center creating 1000’s of optical fiber sensors for measuring damage in aerospace vehicles. After hanging up his space boots his mission, as Head of NASA Education, was to use his life story as an athlete, astronaut, scientist, engineer, musician and now educator to help inspire the next generation of explorers to pursue Science Technology Engineering,Art, and Mathematics (S.T.E.A.M.) careers. Leland holds five honorary doctorates for his service in education, the sciences and philanthropy. Leland was chosen as an ICON MANN with Quincy Jones, Forrest Whitaker, Steve Harvey and 24 other men selected who inspire many different generations with their vision, ability, commitment and success in creating positive changes throughout the world. He has been honored by the NFL Players Association Award of Excellence and has published many technical articles on nondestructive evaluation and sensor research. Leland has written his memoir, “Chasing Space An Astronaut’s Story of Grit, Grace, and Second Chances” along with a Young Readers Edition with S.T.E.A.M. activities in the back. Leland hosted two seasons of Lifetime Television’s competition series “Child Genius” and was a judge for two seasons on ABC Television’s “BattleBots”. He appeared on Top Chef as a celebrity judge,while Cesar Milan, The Dog Whisperer, helped him with his unruly pooch Jake. He was featured in the documentary showing the making and transmission of “Reach for the Stars” will.i.am’s song which traveled to Mars and back done to inspire students to pursue S.T.E.A.M. After 24 years with NASA as a researcher, astronaut and Senior Executive Service (SES) leader he looks to share his stories of perseverance, dedication and excellence to inspire. more information: http://lelandmelvin.com

Kristen Leroy
Kristen LeRoy is the Program Manager of the Artificial Lung Program at Lung Biotechnology PBC, a wholly owned subsidiary of United Therapeutics Inc. Ms LeRoy’s operational experience has focused on execution of animal and pre-clinical human subject trials evaluating medical device technologies in preparation for FDA discussions regarding approval pathways. Her prior leadership positions include Director of R&D Operations at Vivonics, Inc. from 2012-2016, Group Leader of Biomedical Devices at Infoscitex Corporation from 2005-2012, and Staff Engineer at Foster-Miller, Inc. in 2002. Ms LeRoy’s career in early stage, government funded Research and Development efforts lead to five issued patents in various biomedical engineering technologies, including the Artificial Lung technology through which she earned her current position.

Dr. Jeffrey Hall
Dr. Jeffrey Hall has served as Lowell’s Director since June 2010. He joined the staff at Lowell in 1992 as a postdoctoral research fellow. He works with Dr. Wes Lockwood, Brian Skiff, and Len Bright on Lowell’s Solar-Stellar Spectrograph (SSS) project, a long-term program involving monitoring of solar and stellar activity cycles, with the goal of lending an astronomical perspective to solar influences on terrestrial climate. Dr. Hall is presently the chair of the American Astronomical Society’s standing committee on light pollution, space debris, and radio interference, and has played an active role in dark-sky preservation efforts around Arizona. In the community, he serves as a member of Flagstaff’s leadership group, the Northern Arizona Leadership Alliance, and is former President of the Governing Board of Northland Preparatory Academy, a college-prep charter school, as well as of the Board of Directors of the Flagstaff Symphony Orchestra. His principal avocation is music, and he has been the substitute organist the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany as long as he has lived in Flagstaff.

Dr. Gerard van Belle
Dr. van Belle is Director of the Navy Precision Optical Interferometer (NPOI). He received his PhD from University of Wyoming in 1996, working on astronomical optical interferometers. He joined NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory that year as an instrument architect for the Keck Interferometer. At JPL he also made scientific use of the Palomar Testbed Interferometer and published extensively on stellar radii and temperatures, and made the first-ever direct measures of non-spherical stellar shapes. In 2002 he transferred to Caltech, where he continued PTI work and also contributed to the Georgia State University CHARA Array commissioning. From 2007 until 2011 he was with the European Southern Observatory in Munich, Germany, working as the Instrument Scientist for the PRIMA and MATISSE instruments for the VLTI facility in Chile. In 2011, he returned to the US to join the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, AZ, where he is continuing research on fundamental stellar parameters.