UR SPIE Student Chapter

Congratulations to our newly elected officers for the next year!

President: Nick Kochan
Vice President: Nick Takaki
Treasurer: Romita Chaudhuri
Secretary: Katie Dunn
Communications: Ben Moon
Web Admin: Saniat Choudhury

Also thank you to our previous officers for a wonderful year!

On Friday April 12th, our student chapter co-hosted a panel with RIT’s OSA/SPIE chapter that focused on graduate student mental health. The panel consisted of alumni from both schools that are currently working in industry, a student from the University of Rochester who is finishing up their Ph.D. in Optics, and a psychology intern from the University of Rochester’s Counseling Center. The event was well attended and consisted of an open question and answer session, small group discussions, and closed with a mindfulness exercise. Afterward, students were invited to play board games.

On April 6th, members of our student chapter presented optics demos to Girl Scouts at their STEM-A-Palooza event in town. The event was attended by many local troops from the Rochester area.

On March 29th students from our chapter went to the George Eastman House. Included in the trip to the museum was a tour of the technology vault, which is not usually open to the public. In the vault, students saw a vast collection of many different cameras spanning decades of the history of photography.

On March 12th and 13th, members of our student chapter visited local middle schools promoting the wonders of optics through an educational laser show. The show was presented by Prismatic Magic and sponsored by SPIE International. It was a great and unique opportunity for outreach and we are grateful to both the local and global optics communities for supporting us in this.

On February 22nd, members from the student chapter went on a tour of Vuzix. This company develops AR/VR glasses and is local to Rochester.

On February 9th, the SPIE student chapter participated in the STEM Superstar event on campus. Members from our chapter presented optics demos to many Girl Scouts from local troops.

On Friday January 25th, we had our Welcome Back party complete with baking contest. We had a lot of great food and desserts with great company. The winners of the contest were Janet Hrdina and David Lippman who went home with an SPIE Field Guide of their choice!

On November 5th, we had our invited speaker event. Dr. Federico Capasso from the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University gave a talk on Flat Optics Based on Metasurfaces. Student members also had the opportunity to go to lunch with the speaker.

Our yearly General Interest Meeting will be Friday, September 21st from noon-1 PM in Goergen 108. Come learn about what we do and also get a free lunch as well as some other free stuff that we’ll be giving away and raffling off!