The latest exhibit at Science City in Union Station takes visitors through a spectrum of light from the moment they walk through the rainbow-lit hallway to exploring radio waves, ultraviolet light and gamma rays.
The $1 million project, Light Lab, was inspired by a proposal from Delta Woods Middle School students in the Blue Springs School District, who were the grand-prize winners of the Battle of the Brains competition.
“It's all about how light works and about electromagnetic spectrum and how it plays a role in our everyday life, and all the different things that you can do with it,” seventh grader Max Brown said.
The 14-student team earned their school $50,000 to put toward STEM — science, technology, engineering and math — education and the opportunity to work with Burns & McDonnell engineers to transform their proposal into a real exhibit at Science City.
Kara Sexton, a seventh grader, said seeing the exhibit fully lit up for the first time on Tuesday was shocking.
“We had this idea and then we got to see it in real time, come to life, just not on paper, but actually be an experience that people get to see and do,” Sexton said.
Sexton originally pitched the idea of an exhibit exploring light to her Delta Woods team, sparked by her love of looking through her open window and seeing the light shine through.
For more than a year, Sexton and her classmates have been working with Burns & McDonnell engineers, architects and construction professionals to bring that idea to life, including what it will look like and which ideas would be included.
Seventh grader Jace Adams said they met at the company’s headquarters to start learning about the design process.
“Then they talked to us in the school about the whole engineering design process, how cool that is,” Adams said. “Then we toured the facility of the work in progress, got to see it behind the scenes, and now we're here.”
Leslie Duke, CEO of Burns & McDonnell, hopes that process inspires more young people to explore STEM as a future career opportunity.
“They have a lot to offer, and they have a lot to provide us if we just unleash them and let their brain power and their infectious energy for the world and the way the world works become a part of what we allow them to step into,” Duke said.
Reese Moreno, a seventh grader, said the process to create the Light Lab was long and complicated — some ideas were redesigned or didn’t make the cut, but all of them changed for the better.
“It was very colorful, much more vibrant than what I expected,” Moreno said. “They turned our ideas from something that was just on the drawing board to something that's truly magnificent.”
One idea that engineers transformed was the laser maze, which nearly all of the Delta Woods students said was their favorite part of the exhibit. Moreno said it originally was going to be a small room that visitors just ran through.
Dylan Schauffler, a seventh grader, said visitors now will enter a tunnel and navigate a web of lasers, then press a button that will add even more.
“It's really fun to play and inside it's really lighted up and the lasers look so crisp and clean,” Schauffler said.
The exhibit also includes spaces where visitors can see their veins with infrared light, draw on walls with ultraviolet light and explore the wavelengths of different elements.
Annie Luu, a seventh grader, said she hopes visitors will leave the exhibit knowing more about light and everything that comes from it.
“It's really a great feeling knowing that you've helped accomplish something as great as this,” Luu said.
The Light Lab marks the eighth student-inspired exhibit Burns & McDonnell has built at Science City, making up more than half of the museum’s square feet.
George Guastello, president and CEO of Union Station, said creating an exhibit is “the Olympics of science” for students. Each exhibit inspired by students includes a picture of them, and he hopes they can visit one day when they’re older and show their own children.
“When you see a child, see themselves in an idea, and then be able to say, ‘I did that, and I did that well,’ it's a very special time,” Guastello said.
And Moreno wants to send the same message to other students who have big ideas.
“No matter your age, you're able to do whatever you really want to. I'm 13 over here, and we just made a million-dollar science exhibit,” Moreno said. “That's pretty awesome, if you ask me.”
