The Lunchbox Interview: Lauren & Daniel (CWSF Ambassadors)

I had a chance this evening to visit the exhibits of the Canada-Wide Science Fair being hosted at the Currie Centre here at UNB. What I saw was amazing, and when you look around at the incredible work they’ve done, it can be easy to forget that the students who created it are quite young.

My guests today don’t forget that: they were there once, in the hot seat and trying to present their projects to curious judges. Lauren Gamble and Daniel O’Niel are both alumni of the fair, having competed in past years. Now, they are two of the CWSF Ambassadors responsible for acting as support for the current student competitors. Lauren has just completed her Bachelor of Science in Nursing at the University of Saskatchewan, and this is her first time as an Ambassador. Daniel just completed his fourth year of his Bio-Chemistry studies at the University of Ottawa.

Part coach, part mentor, part friend, the ambassadors focus on helping the students deal with the pressure and nervousness of being judged. We talked about their own experiences at being former competitors (Lauren competed once before; Daniel three times), what being part of this competition can me, and how things have changed in the years since they were on the other side of the displays.

Public viewing of the exhibits is from 1pm to 8pm on Thursday, May 14, and from 9am to noon both Friday, May 15 and Saturday, May 16.

Music today:

My guests explained that you’ll have somewhere between 30 seconds and 7 minutes to explain your project, so I figured that students would definitely reflect Clock from Instruments (from their science-prediction sounding album, The End Of Light By Heat).
And maybe it has something to do with Golf Day today, but I chose the song Rich People Don’t Smoke by Tallest to Shortest, taken from their self-titled album.