I’m back! After a long summer break, we’re back in school and back to writing more blog posts. New school year means new classes and also more school trips! If you’ve read my last post you would already know that we went all the way to Washington and Oregon to complete our last unit. First of all before we begin, I wanted to mention how amazing these trips are. We get so many opportunities like this that many people don’t get, and I’m always very thankful of this.

As fun as it is on these trips, we actually learn more than anybody could learn by just sitting in a class room. We gain new perspectives that really can’t be explained through the internet or Google. You can see this throughout the mini assignments and big project we did on the trip by pressing here. By now you’re probably wondering what we did on this trip, so lets get to the highlights!

At the Vista House, overlooking the Colombia River.

We kicked off the trip bright and early and began our journey from Seycove Secondary all the way to Lacey, Washington (5ish hrs). We made a quick stop for lunch then hopped on the bus for a few more hours to Portland, Oregon. Once we got to Portland we immediately stopped at the biggest book store in the world… Powell’s City Of Books! This book store was amazing, it literally had everything you could think of. It is stuffed with more than 1 million books, and takes up an entire city block.

Standing in front of Powell’s Books.

We had two hours there and during that time we had to complete a challenge. For this challenge we had to choose one book with a funny title, and recreate it. We chose the “Billion Dollar Whale”, so of course this happened…

After finding our way out of that book store we went to dinner. For dinner we went someplace called “Fire On The Mountain”. They served amazing wings as well as really spicy wings that you had to sign a consent form to eat! Even thought the food was amazing, the cherry on top of the day was the movie. We went someplace called the “McMenamins Kennedy School”. It was essentially an old school that was renovated into a hotel, bar and movie theatre! We ended up going to watch “Mama Mia”, which I would give a 7.5/10 (not that you care).

After eating wings at Fire on the Mountain!

The next day we went to Reed College to look at their very own nuclear reactor. Learning about the reactors in class was very interesting and all, but actually standing overtop of it is the most mesmerizing thing you will ever see. When the reactor is activated and the lights are turned off the reactor gives off the most vibrant blue luminescence. When I saw images or clips in movies I always thought it was edited in, but there’s actually a science behind it. Basically what happens is something called Cherenkov Radiation, it’s caused by a charged particle moving in a medium (water in this case) faster than light would in that same medium. The speed of light in a vacuum is a universal constant (c) which is 186,000 miles per second.

Made by me, in Paper Pro.

Now, if light is no longer traveling in a vacuum but a medium (the reactors medium is water because that’s what it’s surrounded in) it slows down. This is just like when a soccer ball rolls across mud- it slows down. The light slowing is the photons interacting with other particles. In water the speed of light is 0.75(c).

Made by me, in Paper Pro.

This is were the magic happens. Since this is a nuclear reactor, charged particles fly off the core at a greater speed than 0.75c. Now that there is an imbalance in the electromagnetic field the state must return to equilibrium, by doing this it releases photons. These photons make up visible light, which is the blue glow you would see. I know… mind blown, i’ll wait a minute for your brain to recuperate.

The reed college was an amazing experience and only supports the importance of these field studies. There is no way I would have remembered half that info if I just read it on the internet. By being there and seeing the reactor work itself I was driven by curiosity, and in turn learned way more than in a classroom.

Outside the chemistry wing at Reed College.

That same day we also went to the Maryhill Museum of Art. This was by far the coolest museum I’ve ever been to. It was originally founded by Sam Hill after purchasing the property and building a house on top of it. The museum is named after his daughter, Mary. It is filled with the most beautiful, priceless works of art and had anything from ancient Chinese or African chess sets to miniature French dolls. The museum included many of Sam’s personal collections as well as his friends and most notably Queen Marie of Romania’s donations of personal goods and artifacts. Just like Powell’s City of Books, the museum was very unique. With this being said, we had to do a challenge! This time we were given the task to talk about something that simply made you curious and talk about what you had discovered about that artifact.

Although this trip was very educational, I just have to talk about the food. The highlight of the trip was probably the endless shrimp at Red Lobster. They had a mass variety of endless shrimp that came in sets of 5 and 10. I ended up eating 15 (I know, I was disappointed too) but might I add, I thoroughly enjoyed those 15 shrimp. Our class record however, was set by Kate Rogers at 140 shrimp!

Finally we ended the trip with a bang by visiting the one and only B–reactor at the Hanford site. As well as the town of White Bluffs, formally known as Hanford. Just like the reactor at Reed College, this was absolutely mesmerizing to stand in front of. We read about how big and extraordinary it was in books and online, but nothing can really compare to when your standing in front of the reactor. On the tour we met some very nice people who knew absolutely everything about the Hanford site and creation of the atomic bomb. Instead of trying to explain to you how the B-reactor works I’ll just draw a less confusing diagram. Also if you haven’t already, feel free to check out my other post (it has a little more info and media on the actual tour as well as the big project we did while we were there).

Made by me, in Paper Pro

I cannot stress enough the importance of field studies. They aid our learning in so many different ways. For example, when I begun this unit I was completely against the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. When we were interviewing the docents, one of them talked about how his uncle wouldn’t have came back from Japan if it wasn’t for the bomb. This totally changed my perspective on everything and pushed me to do more research and the importance of understanding all perspectives before making decisions. I’m not saying that my opinion is totally changed, but I learned the importance of perspective.

Once again this is something I would have never been able to learn if I was stuck in a classroom. I have to admit, I wasn’t that interested in atomic bombs, WWII or the history behind all it when we started the unit. I think it was because I had never experienced anything like it before, It was just a figment of my imagination. The trip absolutely changed my opinion on this topic though. After hearing the story’s of people working on the bomb, seeing the reactor at read college, the countless museums, touring Hanford and what was formally known as White Bluffs the history was no longer a figment of my imagination but something I had experienced.