SnapGlow.TV: Modern Gems Galore! Surrounded by rare antique racing cars, Daniel Sanchez, 18, of Spain, let a 16-pound bowling ball slide out of his hands and roll down an aluminum ramp.
The ball picked up speed as it came off the two-foot-long ramp, but 16-year-old Ismail Khan of Pakistan sprang into action. He began tapping the ball with a broom to move it in a circle and eventually stop it.
Sanchez and Khan were among 34 high school students from around the world conducting physics experiments yesterday at the Simeone Foundation Automotive Museum. The students are attending a month-long physics camp at the University of Pennsylvania.
"You think racing is thrilling, try bringing 34 high school kids and 16 bowling balls into an antiques museum," said Bill Berner, who has run the camp for 11 years. "That is a thrill."
The experiments were designed to teach the students about inertia, an important concept in physics, said Craig Halpern, 38, who has taught at the camp for eight years. During the school year, he teaches physics at Ewing (N.J.) High School.
An example of inertia, Halpern said, is what happens when an individual is driving a car and then stops it suddenly.
"When you lurch forward," he said, "that's inertia."
Berner, who also works with undergraduate students during the year through Penn's physics-demonstration laboratory, is a race-car enthusiast. He contacted the museum a few weeks ago with his idea to run the racing experiments in the showroom.
The museum, near Philadelphia International Airport, is home to a collection of 65 antique race cars built between 1909 and 1975. It opened last summer after the cars were donated by Fred Simeone, a local collector who serves as the foundation's executive director.
Given the success of yesterday's visit, museum spokesman Harry Hurst said, he hoped to invite more high school groups in the future.
Berner and other camp staff - most of whom teach high school physics during the school year - set up the experiments Thursday night. In the middle of the museum, they put down eight pieces of blue tarp, each with two tracks marked with red and black tape, and the two-foot-long aluminum ramp.
The space was ringed by antique cars, but the area where the students did the experiments was fenced in by blown-up old photos from racing-car history.
Groups of four or five students gathered around a tarp and were given two bowling balls - one about 16 pounds and one less than 10 - donated by area bowling alleys. They were told to roll their bowling ball down the ramp and then use the broom to guide it along the tracks. Other experiments included a straight course where students practiced speeding up and slowing the bowling balls. The main event was a winding race course, inspired by the surroundings.
Although the students attend lectures during the day, hands-on experiments give them "a gut sense of how nature works," Berner added.
The field trip was also a chance for the students to work together and, in many cases, bond with their multinational classmates.
Kelly Rhodes, 17, a rising senior at Emmaus (Pa.) High School, was working with Giorgio Nicola, 17, of Rome. He had recently taught her the Italian words for two mathematical terms, sine and cosine.
"It's not a problem at all" communicating with the international students, who make up about a third of the campers, Rhodes said.
She is one of 11 young women attending the camp this summer. Berner said the number of girls enrolling in the camp had steadily increased in the last five years, proof that barriers were dropping for women in the sciences.
The failing economy has been a concern for Berner, given the camp's $6,000 price tag. He said that the camp did not see a significant drop in applications this year, but that he still hoped to offer more financial aid options in the future and expand its reach.
From the students' diverse backgrounds and interest in physics to the access to university resources and interactive field trips, Berner said, the camp is "a teaching dream."
Contact staff writer Zoe Tillman at 215-854-2917 or ztillman@phillynews.com.
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