Sharing Science, Sparking Wonder

Since 2022, I’ve had the privilege of connecting with young minds across Virginia through outreach programs aimed at elementary/middle schoolers. Be it the buzzing energy of Kids Tech University to the quiet curiosity of students in neighboring counties near Blacksburg, I’ve used storytelling, craft, and hands-on science to pull back the curtain on the microbial world. I show how the often misunderstood bacteria can move with purpose, navigate complex environments, and be reimagined as tools for healing.

With each swabbed petri dish, each syrup-soaked model bacterium, and every wide-eyed student when they hear that bacteria could one day be superheroes, I find my own passion reflected back. This is more than science communication, it is a contagious belief that discovery doesn’t only happen in the lab. Sometimes, it starts in a school gym, or a makeshift science fair table, or with a child asking, “Can they swim through skin?"