In the series, under the watchful eye of their professor, John Dolhun, and two teaching assistants, the freshmen - most of whom were part of the cohort Dow sought to reach - spend hours in the lab, familiarizing themselves with the mechanics of various chemistry techniques. (Zaidan produced and directed the series.) Dow gave $500,000 in funding for the project and two related others, under a larger $2 million grant to promote STEM subjects among women and underrepresented minorities. ChemLab Boot Camp would target pre-college students, capturing on film MIT life and the mostly rewarding, sometimes frustrating learning experience in lab.
The question loomed large in Essigmann's mind: "How do you get students in high school and maybe junior high more interested in chemistry?" Bringing in his former MIT undergraduate advisee, George Zaidan, now a freelance science director and producer, the idea for a reality series was hatched.
The 11-part series emerged from discussions between the MIT Chemistry department and the Dow Chemical Company about how to best prepare the next generation of chemical engineers and material scientists, said professor of chemistry and biological engineering John Essigmann, who was also executive producer of the series. For nearly four weeks last January, Kang and 13 other freshmen navigated the chemistry lab - many, for the first time - in a made-for-internet reality series that premiered earlier this fall called ChemLab Boot Camp. But in a twist, scenes now documented on film and posted online for all to see as part of the school's latest effort to promote Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education. But Kang was not alone, and several of her classmates, too, had run into trouble: there were spills, broken test tubes, starts and restarts.Īll part of a day's work in MIT's introductory course for freshmen, 5.301: Chemistry Laboratory Techniques. Among Kang's missteps: overheating a chemical mixture, using a too-small funnel, dropping the funnel to the ground. "I've made like two, actually three mistakes today," she confesses.
Hansol Kang, a freshman at MIT, looks slightly blushed behind plastic goggles. Students Dan Zang (left) and Hansol Kang (right) are two of the 14 freshmen who agreed to have their chemistry class taped for the Web-reality show ChemLab Boot Camp.