Community Outreach Opportunities
Northwest Noggin (the “Northwest Neuroscience Outreach Group – Growing in Networks”) is a robust, creative and entirely volunteer driven non-profit organization (EIN: 81-3885713) that brings scientists and artists and students of all ages together to contribute their expertise, listen and learn from others, enthuse young people about science and art, share area educational resources, and inform and excite the public about ongoing, taxpayer supported neuroscience research.
Our graduate and undergraduate volunteers are developing experts in science communication, teaching in academic priority K-12 schools, theaters, museums, youth correctional facilities, symphonies, hospitals, houseless youth centers, breweries (including the legendary Fort George :), coffee shops (including Astoria’s Street 14), Native American summer camps, Congress and bike shop pubs!
Since 2012, we’ve brought real human brains and STEAM art projects to more than 45,000 students in Portland, Vancouver, Astoria, Warrenton, eastern, coastal and southern Oregon, eastern Washington, San Diego, Chicago and DC public schools! We’ve offered free collaborative talks from graduate and postdoctoral neuroscientists and artists at local venues, and have informed thousands of community members about current, federally funded research, training graduates to innovatively and effectively present their work to a lay audience.
For more information, visit our webpage here
Ran by Dr. Ben Zimmerman and Dr. Payel Kundu
Our Current Book List:
The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt's New World by Andrea Wulf
Honeybee Democracy by Thomas Seeley
The Mind's Own Physician: A Scientific Dialogue with the Dalai Lama on the Healing Power of Meditation by Zara Houshmand, Jon Kabat-Zinn, and Richard Davidson
The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present by Eric Kandel
Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain by John Ratey
DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences by Rick Strassman
The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy: Engaging the Rhythm of Regulation by Deb Dana and Stephen Porges
Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap Between Us and Them by Joshua Greene
Archeology of the Mind: Neuroevolutionary Origins of Human Emotions by Jaak Panksepp and Lucy Biven
The Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould
A Thousand Brains: A New Theory of Intelligence by Jeff Hawkins
Nose Dive: A Field Guide to the World's Smells by Harold McGee