Back in October, 2003, and at the urging of Cathy Otto, ASCLS Region IX exhibited at the National Association of Biology Teachers Convention that was held in Portland this year.  We paid our exhibit fee (a lot!) and because the costs were so high, we either did without or brought our own items from home or work.  For example, we decided to not have the ASCLS CD on careers play since to have electricity in our booth would have cost several hundred extra dollars.  And Cathy was able to get a table from her office at work and I brought a couple of folding chairs from home.

    So in the pouring rain we dragged in all our supplies and set up our booth.  And for two and a half days several members of OACLS sat there with smiles on our faces.  Many, many thanks go to Cathy Otto (who did the lion’s share of booth sitting), Mark Zimmerdahl, Cheryl Thomas, and Jeff Josifek who drove all the way up from Salem.  It was fun to see the other booths and I am sure the educators among us appreciated this opportunity. 

    We did have a number of people stop at our booth and they were all interesting to talk with.  Unfortunately, most of them said “I used to be a med tech before I went into teaching” or “My mother (sister, aunt) was a med tech”.  My hopes in exhibiting were that we could reach high school teachers, expose them to the profession and they in turn would let their students know of    the professional opportunities.   But we

did get at least two potentially exciting contacts during the three days.

    One teacher from Benson High School in Portland told us about a Health Careers class that Benson offers.  And she asked if there was some way we could give lab tours to her students.  Eureka!!   At least one golden opportunity –hopefully- awaited us.  Another teacher stopped to ask if we ever did anything like mentoring high school students in science projects.

   This last one turned out to be a real score.  I was contacted about a month later by a sophomore student at LaSalle High School in Milwaukie to ask if I would be willing to help them with their entry to the Intel Science Fair.  And of course I said yes, not having the faintest idea what I was getting into.  As it turns out, there are three sophomore students in the Honors Biology class at LaSalle and it was their teacher who had stopped at our booth.  Their project is bacterial growth in re-used water bottles.  It is exciting to see these kids work.  And it is fun.  I am impressed with their depth of thought every time we meet.

   What will happen at the Intel Science Fair remains unknown.  But I am having fun and these three students now know that there is such a thing as Clinical Laboratory Science.  So if you ever have the opportunity to get involved with students, DO IT.  You have nothing to lose and a lot to gain.