Throughout 2007, the Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, under the guidance of the Dean, Professor Ronald Young and Sub-Dean, Novelette Saddler McKnight, has engaged in several outreach programmes island-wide to address the issue of developing greater interest, motivation and skill among Jamaica’s secondary-level students in the area of science and technology.

The Faculty also has given tremendous support to programmes initiated by the Department of Physics, The Department of Chemistry and the Electronics Unit among others, in facilitating specialized training and professional development for both teachers and post-graduate students in these areas.

A major contribution this year is the Electronics Unit’s fabrication and introduction of a prototype, the LabPro Max (LPM) , ‘a lab equipment for the electronics experiments required for High School Physics’ which is intended to enhance the teaching of electronics in high-schools particularly for students at the CSEC and CAPE levels.

The Electronics Unit with the assistance of a small group of its final year and second year students from Department of Physics have recently fabricated a larger set of the LPM for field testing and the device has so far met all expectations. The LapPro Max is also being made with the additional feature of a Scope Card which connects to a monitor, computer or laptop allowing it to be used as an Oscilloscope.

This initiative, directed by Dean Young, is coordinated and managed by Dr. Paul Aiken of the Electronics Unit, Mr. Basil Mangaroo of the Department of Chemistry and four volunteer technologists within the Electronics Unit.

It is hoped that in future, within high-schools, one LPM unit will be made available for every two students, which comprises approximately 1500 units to be distributed throughout Jamaica and another 5000 units throughout the Caricom region.