A Gathering for Science Geeks, Math Nerds, and Really Brainy Boys and Girls of All Types

With the stirring theme march of Star Wars and the loud pops of state-of-the-art science experiments as aural background, thousands and thousands of budding young scientists, technologists, engineers, and mathematicians packed the Walter E. Washington Convention Center this past weekend for the free 2014 USA Science and Engineering Festival.

From astrophysics to zoology, if a subject involved science it was represented somewhere on the vast convention floor.

And when we used the word packed in our opening paragraph, we were engaging in understatement. How packed was it, you ask? Well, one of the guest speakers was basketball great and African-American student encourager Kareem Abdul Jabbar.  Now you would expect it would be easy to find a 7 foot, 2 inch man, right? Wrong. Despite searching for more than a half hour, the convention was so crowded we weren't able to find Jabbar's book signing spot.

But here is a pictorial capturing of some of what we did see:

You could learn about the science of sound ...

... or make some really loud music of your own.

Did we mention the crowd was large?

But there were a few quiet places to relax

You could explore something as big as the world ...

... or as small as a part of an atom.

There were robots that could do flips ...

... and robots that could fling frisbees.

You could build things and take them home ...

... become part of the big picture ...

... or use your nerd skills to create a weapon from scratch to stave off the Zombie Apocalypse.

You could visit the STEM Fab Lab ....

... or the giant Vortex welding truck.

You could see big name scientists like Bill Nye the Science Guy from a distance.  ...

... or  the less well-known science guy up close and personal.

You could encounter characters from science like Booker T. Washington and Nicola Tesla.

You could even get a hug if you needed one.

You could visit big space ships  ...

You could check out your favorite bugs ...

... or pick up some favorite science books.

But no matter what you chose to do, you found that Geek (and all its derivatives ) was not only the good word for the day, but a great way to use your talents and live your life.  So let's hear it for Brain Beats Brawn and Go Nerds.