History of the School
VISNJAN OBSERVATORY AND VISNJAN SCHOOL OF ASTRONOMY
Development of the American space program in 1970s inspired many astronomy enthusiasts to start observing the sky and build their own telescopes. Village Visnjan, situated near the Croatian coast, was home to such a group of people. One of them, Korado Korlevic, went on to study physics and eventually became a teacher in the village primary school. Understanding the potential of his students, he thought they would benefit greatly by being introduced to the world of real scientific research as early as possible.In 1986, Korado and his collegues founded the Visnjan School of Astronomy (VSA), an educational program centered around the 10-day summer camp for high-school students. The idea of the camp was to provide students with some experience in research, spark their imagination and motivate them to do more. During the camp, participants would work on a specific project in a small group of three or four, guided by a mentor. The program was accompanied by lectures and regular progress reports given by participants. After the camp was over, they would visit Visnjan periodically to continue working on the projects initiated at the School. In 1990s, participants developed scientific equipment and software for observation of asteroids, making numerous discoveries and placing Visnjan Observatory on the list of world’s most productive observatories by the number of newly discovered asteroids.
BEGINNING OF THE SUMMER SCHOOL OF SCIENCE: 2001-2003
A number of VSA participants went on to study astronomy and natural sciences. Having vivid memories of the camp and the impact it had on them, they wanted to provide the younger generation with a similar experience, but with an accent on their own fields of interests: biology, chemistry and physics. As a result, two new summer camps were initiated in 2001: the Summer School of Science for high-school students and Youth Science Camp (YSC) for primary school students.
The first Summer School of Science camp was organized by Jasna Lay, a psychologist from Zagreb, with the help of Korado Korlevic. The program was a replica of VSA: a combination of project work, lectures and progress reports given by the students. Participants were high school students selected from science competitions in Croatia. Ana Bedalov, a physics student at the time, was one of the mentors at the first camp and organized the camp in the two following years. By inviting participants from Slovenia and Hungary, she made the School international and introduced English as an official language. In order to have all disciplines represented at the School, young scientists were invited as lecturers and recruited as project leaders for the following year.
The first Summer School of Science camp was organized by Jasna Lay, a psychologist from Zagreb, with the help of Korado Korlevic. The program was a replica of VSA: a combination of project work, lectures and progress reports given by the students. Participants were high school students selected from science competitions in Croatia. Ana Bedalov, a physics student at the time, was one of the mentors at the first camp and organized the camp in the two following years. By inviting participants from Slovenia and Hungary, she made the School international and introduced English as an official language. In order to have all disciplines represented at the School, young scientists were invited as lecturers and recruited as project leaders for the following year.
PERFECTING THE MODEL AND BUILDING THE COMMUNITY: 2004-2006
In the early years, the School was faced with many challenges. It depended, as it still does, on the enthusiasm of university students and young scientists who would volunteer as mentors. The primary goal set by the new organizers, Branimir Lukic and Martina Mijuskovic, both PhD students in Switzerland at the time, was to build a strong community. To engage and attract more undergraduate students to the team, they expanded the program of the School to include a special workshop, called “Swapshop” (as in “swapping” projects). For half-a-day, participants had a chance to work with an undergraduate student on a different topic, a small project on its own. Swapshop developed into a training ground for future mentors and project leaders. Many of them were former School participants who later took over significant roles inside the School.
During this period, the School became fully international, enabling more foreign students to experience the School which would promote international and intercultural understanding. In addition to Hungary, cooperation with similar programs is US was also established to bring more foreign students. In addition, more and more foreign young scientists, mostly from organizers’s Swiss networks, were attracted as mentors. Lack of equipment and material was a significant challenge, limiting the range of topics at the School. Most projects were imaginatively done with improvised or borrowed equipment and the School depended greatly on cooperation with research groups in Croatia and abroad. The program of the School also expanded to include “Science and Society” workshops. Aiming to put science in a wider social context, the topics on these workshops included science communication, ethics and pseudoscience in the media.
As the diversity of people and quality of the projects grew, the School became well known among high-school students who started to apply in large numbers. Unfortunately, they couldn’t all be placed in the camp that had capacity for only 15 students.
During this period, the School became fully international, enabling more foreign students to experience the School which would promote international and intercultural understanding. In addition to Hungary, cooperation with similar programs is US was also established to bring more foreign students. In addition, more and more foreign young scientists, mostly from organizers’s Swiss networks, were attracted as mentors. Lack of equipment and material was a significant challenge, limiting the range of topics at the School. Most projects were imaginatively done with improvised or borrowed equipment and the School depended greatly on cooperation with research groups in Croatia and abroad. The program of the School also expanded to include “Science and Society” workshops. Aiming to put science in a wider social context, the topics on these workshops included science communication, ethics and pseudoscience in the media.
As the diversity of people and quality of the projects grew, the School became well known among high-school students who started to apply in large numbers. Unfortunately, they couldn’t all be placed in the camp that had capacity for only 15 students.
GROWTH AND EXPANSION: 2007-2009
Already in 2005, by creating the “Swapshop”, an important idea was conceived. It was about older generations of School participants “taking care” of the younger ones. The idea was realized completely when in 2007, the School achieved enough human capacity to expand from one to two camps: named S3 and S3++. S3camp was intended for younger participants (9th and 10th grade) and led by undergraduate students. S3++ camp was intended for older participants (11th and 12th grade) and led by graduate students. Number of participants thus doubled, enabling more students to experience the School and join the community. With some former participants (Branko Durdevic, Nino Antulov-Fantulin, Tomislav Kokotovic) or Swapshop leaders (Andjela Saric) becoming new organizers – the community started to grow very fast. The team later included Marko Kosicek, Fran Supek and Nenad Katanic – mostly people from their networks.
In this period, the international cooperation was expanded to include regular participants from France and Serbia. Thanks to donations from many friends and supporters, the labs were better equipped and quality of projects continued to grow.
The main challenge became the need to pass on the experience and training, which now also included the need to train new organizers. The Organizing Committee was established in 2009 to oversee the functioning of the School and to maintain and improve the quality from year to year.
In this period, the international cooperation was expanded to include regular participants from France and Serbia. Thanks to donations from many friends and supporters, the labs were better equipped and quality of projects continued to grow.
The main challenge became the need to pass on the experience and training, which now also included the need to train new organizers. The Organizing Committee was established in 2009 to oversee the functioning of the School and to maintain and improve the quality from year to year.
CELEBRATING THE 10TH YEAR ANNIVERSARY
In its tenth edition in 2010, both camps of Summer School of Science were made international (from 2007 to 2009 only S3++ camp was held in English). Our alumni now numbers around 150 and we have an extensive range of contacts among professional scientists in Croatia and abroad. Our main challenges, except fundraising, continue to be networking and community building in order to expand our reach to larger number of high-school students interested in science.