Last month, Jingyi Shen, a Ph.D. student in the School of Science at Westlake University, took a break from her research work and headed to the western part of China.

She spent five days in Dege and Baiyu Counties of Sichuan Province's Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. She was accompanied by six other Westlake students. During this time, she met with primary and middle school students, discussing the role of science in society, catering to all of their curiosities, and involving them in fun science experiments.

Their visit to schools in Ganzi was part of a summer social practice program launched by the Westlake University Popularization Group, in the support of the Westlake Education Foundation. The theme of the summer program is “Planting the Tree of Science, Sowing the Future of Humanity.” The program aims to foster curiosity about science and a spirit of exploration among school children by nurturing meaningful connections between them and young researchers like Jingyi.

Jingyi, a native of Hangzhou, said she signed up for the program out of her desire to engage with communities and inspire young girls to embrace science. Also, the 25-year-old wanted to experience life in Ganzi, a mountainous area she had heard so much about but never had the opportunity to visit before.

“As much as I was fascinated by the scenery there, I was even more amazed by the enthusiasm and interest shown by the students about what we do as researchers at Westlake and science in general,” said she, who is pursuing her doctoral research on exploring the properties and mechanisms of high-temperature cuprate superconductors. She works in the lab of Prof. Jie Wu at the Department of Physics.       

She still recalls the excitement on the school students’ faces when she told them during one of her classes that they would be taking part in experiments, apart from listening to her talk about science.

To help the students grasp the concept and characteristics of resistance more easily, Jingyi set up an interactive activity where they could conduct their own experiments and witness firsthand how resistance changes with temperature.  

Besides, she also took the opportunity to inspire the young girls there to follow in her footsteps.

"Compared to boys, girls are still underrepresented in scientific endeavors. We need to nurture more girls to embrace STEM," Jingyi said.

She hopes that activities like the ones conducted by her team will motivate more and more school children, especially girls, to pursue their studies in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and become the next-generation scientists, working towards solving the pressing problems facing our times.

As long as a seed of science is sowed in the hearts of the young generation, Jingyi believes it will take root, sprout, blossom and bear fruit someday in the near future.