Daniel C

Welcome! Do you want to participate in a virtual forensics lab? What about learning about why acids like HCl (Hydrochloric Acid) will react with bases specifically? Well then, you're in the right place! My name is Daniel Chen. I have participated in science olympiad since middle school, and first competed at the national competition as a high school freshman after making it onto my school's varsity team. I made it off of three events, fossils, EV, and forensics! Although I have done well in fossils, I am more passionate and excited about forensics, which is why I am teaching this course! This workshop will consist of at least 18 total sessions, going into most school years. Each session we will cover a specific topic of forensics, from powders to fibers to fingerprints. Sessions will be held each week on Tuesdays from 4:30 to 5:30 PM EST. Sessions will typically be held to be about 1 hour long although I will usually be perfectly fine with going over if we need to cover some more material, or if there are questions. Attendance is all up to you! I understand that school can be very stressful, and the mandatory attendance is not ideal. While it is 100% your choice for how you would like to attend sessions, keep in mind that lacking knowledge in some specific parts can be difficult to keep learning down the course, so I would recommend attending the sessions as much as possible. Here is a full outline of the list of topics we will cover: Powders Plastics Fibers Hairs Chromatography Mass Spectrometry Fingerprints DNA Glass Entomology Blood Seeds and Pollen Tracks and Soil Bullet Striations Analysis Cheat sheet making Test Strategies and Planning Note that some of the topics may require more than one day to fully teach and understand, and that more sessions will be added as the series commences to accommodate for the following topics. Of course, this course will be very comprehensive, which is why, as science olympiad also allows, we will be making our very own cheat sheet! A cheat sheet, for those who don't know, is a standard letter size paper filled to the brim with information that science olympiad allows competitors to bring and use on tests! When we make our very own cheat sheet, we will pack it with vasts amount of information; for reference, my cheat sheet is currently about size 3.5-4. Video recordings of lab demonstrations may also be shown later on in the course. I hope you enjoy your stay at this Science Olympiad Forensics course, and I wish you the best of luck, detective!