Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (near Dayton, OH) continues to offer a unique educational outreach program, Scanning Electron Microscopy EDucatorS (SEMEDS; pronounced sem-eds). This ten year old motivational science program provides an opportunity for students and educators to visit the Materials and Manufacturing Directorate's research laboratories, where scanning electron microscopes (SEMs) are used by scientists and engineers working in diverse areas of materials research.
As a favorite motivational science program, SEMEDS serves surrounding communities by bringing students and educators on-site to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base's Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to operate state-of-the-art SEMs in a real life research laboratory setting. The special features of this program include: exposure to a world-class facility, introductions to the elite researchers who work there, and an opportunity for students to operate the same equipment used by the facility researchers.
SEMEDS is an after school program intended for middle school and high school students.