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Rockfest is coming up at Tellus Museum
If your child is into cool rocks, the annual Rockfest rock show at Tellus Museum, June 14 and 15, is the place to be. Kids will be able to see thousands of rocks and minerals, crack open geodes, see how rocks are made into jewelry, and do geology-themed activities.
Pro tip: Many of the rocks and gems on display will be for sale by vendors, so set expectations — and maybe a shopping budget — with your child ahead of time. If you want to just look and not buy anything, in my experience, the vendors are totally fine with that, especially when dealing with children who love rocks and gems. After all, most of the vendors are rock lovers, too.
The event will run from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. both days, although some activities will end at 4 p.m.
Admission to Rockfest is covered by general admission to the museum.
Four upcoming science activities, all free
Science ATL, the group that organizes the annual Atlanta Science Festival, has three upcoming “science walks” and a presentation about computers that interface with the human brain.
- Discovery Walk along South Peachtree Creek in DeKalb County – tomorrow, May 3
- Nature Navigators walk at Sweetwater Creek in Lithia Springs – Saturday, May 17
- Discovery Walk at Emory University – Saturday, May 31
- “StoryCollider” show at Georgia Tech, featuring people whose lives were changed by computers that connect to the brain – Wednesday, May 7
All of these events are free, but advance registration is required. If you want to be notified about events like these in the future, sign up for Science ATL’s newsletter.
April workshops at Georgia Tech
Registration is open for Georgia Tech’s K.I.D.S. Club and STEAM Workshop classes for Saturday, April 19, 2025.
K.I.D.S. Club is open to students in grades 2 through 5. STEAM Workshops are for students in grades 6 through 12. Topics vary by age group. All workshops meet on the Georgia Tech campus from 9 a.m. to noon.
Summer camps at West Georgia
University of West Georgia has opened registration for its 2025 youth summer camps, being held this June and July. Camps are available for rising kindergartners through rising 12th graders.
For grades K-2, Wolves Exploration Camp will run daily from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. From UWG’s description, this is an immersive camp that emphasizes activity outside the classroom.
STEM camps are open to rising K-8. These camps are being operated by the Georgia Youth Science and Technology Center.
Students rising to grades 6 through 12 can enroll in UWG Immersion Camps. These sessions are led by UWG faculty and staff, covering such topics as film, archaeology, esports and more.
Georgia Tech registration for March 29 workshops
Registration is open for Georgia Tech’s K.I.D.S. Club and STEAM Workshop classes for Saturday, March 29.
K.I.D.S. Club is open to students in grades 2 through 5. STEAM Workshops are for students in grades 6 through 12. Topics vary by age group. All workshops meet on the Georgia Tech campus from 9 a.m. to noon.
Georgia Tech spring break camp registration now open
Registration opens today for the Spring into STEAM program at Georgia Tech. This one-week program for middle-school students will be held on the Georgia Tech campus the week of April 7-11, 2025.
Each day has its own theme, and registration is by the day, not by the week, so students can attend as few or as many days as they want.
The announced themes are:
- Monday: Biology
- Tuesday: Coding
- Wednesday: Design engineering
- Thursday: Art
- Friday: Mathematics
Each day’s session runs from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., with extended care offered until 5:00 p.m. at no extra charge. Registration is $125 per day, which includes all materials, lunch, and a snack.
Panel discussion will give girls encouragement to pursue STEM careers
Girls interested in STEM fields can hear from women in STEM at the STEM Gems Summit on March 15, 2025 at Spelman College. This event will feature a panel of women who work in fields such as chemistry, biology, and cybersecurity. Presenters will talk about the work they do and the journey they took to get to their current positions, giving advice to girls who want to pursue a career in STEM.
Tickets are $5 for kids and $10 for adults.
STEM Gems is the brainchild of scientist Stephany Espy, who seeks to inspire girls to pursue STEM careers by exposing them to successful mentors.
Georgia Tech summer programs
Georgia Tech has opened registration for its summer 2025 programs.
- The Summer P.E.A.K.S. Program is a series of one- and two-week sessions for rising 2nd- to 12th-grade students. Themes include drones, makerspace design and engineering, sports science, robotics, animation, architecture and coding. Elementary- and middle-school programs typically meet from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily on the Georgia Tech campus; some high-school-level sessions may run until 5 p.m.
- Scroll all the way to the bottom of the registration page to find information on the Robotics Institute, a one-week residential program for current high-school students who are passionate about robotics. This program requires an application for acceptance.
- NextGen Innovators is a new, middle-school Summer P.E.A.K.S. session that will be held June 23-27 in Technology Park in Peachtree Corners (Gwinnett County). Students will explore how STEAM solutions can address real-world challenges such as renewable energy and clean water. Find the details and register for this program by scrolling down the registration page to the middle-school section and looking in the Week 4 programs.
For most Georgia Tech programs, registration remains open until one week before the program’s start date. However, this may not be true for all programs, and there are limited available spaces for all programs.
Great Backyard Bird Count is this weekend
The annual Great Backyard Bird Count will take place this Friday, Feb. 14, through Monday, Feb. 17. This worldwide citizen science project, which started in 1998, is a cooperative effort among the National Audubon Society, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and Birds Canada.
To participate, you’ll watch birds anywhere you like — your back yard, a local park, or maybe around your school playground. You can observe for as little as 15 minutes on any of the four days. If you want to do more, you can count on more than one day, or watch for a longer time period. After counting the birds, you’ll send in your data, either with a mobile app or through the eBird website.
Not only can you collect data for these projects, but you can also view the data being collected all over the world — a great opportunity to see scientific research in action.
Make plans for the Atlanta Science Festival
Admittedly, the past few years I’ve done a not-so-great job of giving advance notice about the Atlanta Science Festival, a two-week festival with dozens of activities for kids, teens, and adults. I tend to see an article about it in the newspaper right before it starts, and by then, all the spots for popular activities have already been taken.
Not this year.
The 2025 Atlanta Science Festival is a little over a month away. It starts March 8 and continues until March 22. The festival website says there are more than 100 activities, many of them hands-on.
The festival will kick off on Saturday, March 8 with Celebrate STEAM at Georgia Tech, a collection of exhibits on the Georgia Tech campus. Over the two weeks that follow, there will be dozens of events in a variety of disciplines. Looking just at the first weekend’s events on the website, topics include animal biomechanics, hydroponic farming, nature journaling, botanical illustration, geology, snakes, ice cream, historic preservation, and a lot more.
As usual, the festival will culminate in the Exploration Expo, a free event with more than 100 informative and interactive booths, Saturday, March 22 at Piedmont Park.
The festival website allows you to search for events by date, topic, audience (age group), or area of town (by ZIP code). You can also search by price to see only the free events.
Many of the planned events require advance registration and have a limited number of spaces.
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