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Community engagement
Changing who gets to do science
This is the part of the lab’s work that has run longest. Since 2003 it has raised $2M and carried African Nova Scotian students from junior high through to university science degrees.
Flagship programme
Imhotep’s Legacy Academy
Imhotep’s Legacy Academy is an informal STEM education programme for students from racial groups under-represented in science, built specifically around the pathway problem: not just interesting young people in science, but getting them to university and keeping them there.
It runs as a chain rather than a single event — junior high after-school programming, high school enrichment, university bridging, and graduate funding through Dalhousie’s Faculty of Graduate Studies and internal scholarships. Each stage hands students to the next.
In June 2018 it received the first Dalhousie President’s Award for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion ever granted.
Holotent
A travelling physics demonstration that has taken holography and optics into communities across Nova Scotia — shopping malls, schools and community centres, laser shows and hands-on experiments. It is the recruitment end of the same pipeline: the first time many students see physics done by somebody in front of them.
How this differs from the equity research
Community engagement and equitable participation in STEMM are separate pieces of work. The research documents experiences and gathers the data on who enters science and who stays. The programmes on this page change who gets the chance — and, over time, what they produce feeds back into that research.
By the numbers
$2M raised for science outreach initiatives
20+ years of continuous programming in Nova Scotia
2018 Imhotep’s Legacy Academy wins Dalhousie’s first President’s Award for EDI
2021 NSERC Award for Science Promotion (individual)
Co-founder, CBSN
Dr Hewitt co-founded the Canadian Black Scientists Network and established CBSN Youth, its science fair competition. More →
CISE Atlantic
The lab’s community engagement connects to CISE Atlantic — the regional community of support for inclusion in science and engineering.
CISE Atlantic is the natural home for the coordination work that outgrew a single lab: regional programming, shared mentoring networks, and the longitudinal data that makes the case to funders.
Science Champion, 2018
Nova Scotia Discovery Centre. Finalist in 2008, 2011, 2012 and 2017.
National network
Canadian Black Scientists Network
Dr Hewitt is a co-founder of the Canadian Black Scientists Network (CBSN), a national network of Black scientists, engineers and health professionals working to make Black excellence in STEMM visible and to open the pathways into it.
CBSN Youth
He also established CBSN Youth, the network’s science fair competition, because a national network needs a way to reach students before they choose their courses, not after. It carries the same pathway thinking as Imhotep’s Legacy Academy to a national audience.
CBSN Youth outcomes
Competitions held, students taking part, and the top projects.
Content needed — Kevin to supply outcome figures, top projects and links to the early news coverage.
In the media
CBSN coverage sits with the rest of the equity record. Equity in STEM coverage →
University collaborations
Beyond Dalhousie
The pathway model started in Nova Scotia but does not belong to one campus. These are the universities the lab works with on outreach and pathway programming.
Ontario
McMaster University
Mac iSTEP, McMaster’s counterpart to Imhotep’s Legacy Academy, was established by Juliet Daniel.
British Columbia
University of British Columbia
With Annette Henry, under the Securing Black Futures programme.
Activities
What we actually run
Programmes, school visits and public events. Some run on a fixed calendar, others happen whenever a teacher asks.
Imhotep’s Legacy Academy
A structured pathway rather than a one-off event: junior high after-school programming, high school enrichment, university bridging, and graduate funding. Each stage hands students to the next, which is the part most outreach misses. Built for students from racial groups under-represented in science, with African Nova Scotian communities at its centre. It received the first Dalhousie President’s Award for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion ever granted, in June 2018.
Holotent
A portable holography and optics exhibit built for the 2005 World Year of Physics, marking the centenary of Einstein’s 1905 papers. In 2005 and 2006 it toured shopping malls across Nova Scotia — Halifax Shopping Centre, Mic Mac Mall, New Minas, Truro, Amherst, Antigonish and Sydney — as well as the Dalhousie Open House and high schools, mainly in HRM, with laser shows and hands-on experiments. Over 640 people visited. For many of the students who meet it, this is the first time they have watched physics done by a person standing in front of them rather than read about it.
High school lab visits and class tours
Classes and small groups come into the lab to see the optical benches running, and students on placement work alongside graduate students on live projects. Recent visitors have included students from Auburn Drive High School. There is no application to write — a teacher tells us what their students are studying and when they are free.
CISE Atlantic
The coordination work that outgrew a single lab: regional programming, shared mentoring networks, and the longitudinal data that makes the case to funders. CISE Atlantic is also where the equitable participation in STEMM research and the outreach programmes meet — one measures whether the other is working.
In the media
Two decades of coverage
Outreach from this lab has been covered continuously since 1999, with an emphasis on pathways for African Nova Scotian youth into university science. The full record — 49 features, interviews and broadcasts — is on Media & recognition, and 18 of them cover Imhotep’s Legacy Academy alone.
Broadcast
CBC and CTV
CBC Information Morning; CTV Live at Five and Maritime News.
Print · Regional
Nova Scotia newspapers
Chronicle Herald, The Daily News and community papers across the province.
Print · Institutional
Magazines and university press
Dalhousie Magazine, Black to Business Magazine, and Dalhousie News articles from 2006 to 2018.
Get involved
Schools, teachers and community groups
We host class tours and high school placements year-round, and we are glad to bring a demonstration to your school or community event. There is no application to write — tell us what interests your students and what dates work. Undergraduate and graduate members of the group who want to help deliver outreach should speak to Dr Hewitt directly.