A Viennese School, the “Theodor Kramer School”, is the first and country wide only high school, to own a transmission electron microscope, as it is used in material sciences and life sciences. Starting September 2016, pupils are invited to witness this fascinating technology live, carry out their own experiments, and learn with and from professionals in the field.
I think our children will greatly benefit from this microscope … it makes a huge difference if you look at those tiny structures in a book or “live”, in a bigger context and at different magnificationsCath Schrempf, parent’s representative
Together with the generous support of JEOL Germany, the Vienna Biocenter Core Facilities (VBCF), AGAR Scientific, Plano, and FIAS this extraordinary project was put in place: Nexperion contributed by planning and managing the move and installation of a second hand JEOL JEM 1210 equipped with a 11 megapixel CCD camera. Training teachers and students, helping them along with their experiments, and giving professional input is part of a long term sponsorship commitment of Nexperion. “The installation was quite challenging,” says Guenter Resch, founder and owner of Nexperion. “The school was not exactly equipped to facilitate a high tech device of this size.” After lots of fiddling, the only sufficiently large room for instrument and visitors was found in the basement and adapted to fit the microscope’s needs.
The electron microscope will be used in diverse subjects such as biology, physics, chemistry, and crafts, under the supervision of specially trained teachers from these fields. It will also be available for pupils from other schools in the Vienna area via dedicated workshops.
Asked about Nexperion’s motivation to contribute time and financial resources to this project, Guenter Resch explained that being able to spark the fascination of science and to observe the educational development of these young students – the future scientists of our country — was extremely rewarding and joyful for him.
To learn more, visit the project page at the school’s website (in German only).