Where is NW Noggin?
Our innovative graduate and undergraduate art and neuroscience volunteers are Regional Arts & Culture Council (RACC) Juice award-winning developing experts in science communication, synapsing for science, and teaching in schools, theaters, museums, urban and rural communities, homeless youth centers, breweries, correctional facilities, Congress and bike shop pubs! For more information see NOGGIN BLOGGIN.NW Noggin is a locally sourced, 501(c)(3) ALL-VOLUNTEER shoestring nonprofit organization. Your tax-deductible contribution supports the purchase of sheep brains, pipe cleaners, electrodes and clay for innovative, arts-integrated outreach, and helps send volunteers from local universities (including Portland State University, OHSU, and other area institutions) to public school classrooms, conferences and free community events.
DONATE HERE!
LEARN MORE: Community Neuroscience: How to Build an Outreach Organization
NW Noggin: Art + Brains
NW Noggin awarded PARC grant!
Moon Hooch as Mind Minister
Join us in Chile in *2027*!
In 2027 we'll return to Valparaíso, Chile, home of the Humboldt squid! 🦑⚡️🧠🎨😃 Just like in 2025, and 2023, we'll explore how neurons carry information, and how research in Chile (involving the squid’s giant fused axons) informed our understanding of the electrical signaling that links our experiences to the world. We’ll visit laboratories to examine the rich history and exciting present of research at the Universidad de Chile en Valparaíso, make art (including arpilleras, woven depictions of experience that help people express challenging memories and preserve them for accountability), and contribute to community engagement with Ciencia al Tiro, a local STEAM (STEM + Arts) outreach nonprofit.
LEARN MORE: LAS NEURONAS SON BACANES. LEARN MORE: Valparaiso - Arte y Cerebros en Chile LEARN MORE: ARTS AND BRAINS IN CHILE
Ventricles in Vancouver!
A few early mornings for our Noggin crew this week – in fact, it was likely too early for most adolescent brains… ? LEARN MORE: Sleep in Adolescents: The Perfect Storm The first biology class at Fort Vancouver High School starts at 7:25am, so we discussed the importance of sleep, how teenagers need at…
Art, pain – and pot?
NW Noggin presented a workshop for the Washington State Psychological Association (WSPA) on Saturday, September 10 at North Seattle Community College. A second workshop will be presented at WSU Vancouver in 2017 (date/time TBD)… WORKSHOP SYLLABUS FROM SEPTEMBER (2 CE): WSPA Art Pain and Cannabinoids September 2016 Cannabis sativa from Vienna Dioscurides, 512 AD Bill Griesar,…
Visual Culture & Cannabis With the WSPA
On Saturday Bill Griesar, Ram Kandasamy, and Jeff Leake joined the Washington State Psychological Association to talk about the science, history, and art of cannabis use. Artists have depicted (and used) cannabis for thousands of years. Examining this visual history both ancient and contemporary can tell us a great deal…
Pikachu or Purkinje?
Northwest Noggin was ably represented at the Camas 4 Kids Health Fair in Camas, Washington this weekend by Joey Seuferling, the Noggin Resource Council member for hospital and health care outreach, who authored this post… It was a beautiful and brainy day at the Camas 4 Kids Health Fair where…
La Alegría de la Ciencia
NW Noggin “charged” south – way south! – to the dramatic, artistically and scientifically rich central coast of Chile, to visit the region where neuroscience blossomed in the second half of the last century, and explore potential links with a celebrated outreach program in Valparaíso… Neurons, of course, carry messages – information about…
Franklin and Phineas Gage
Some healthy frontal lobe development was underway in Portland Public Schools this morning..! Noggin volunteers were invited by the Academic Youth Development (AYD) program, a summer effort by PPS to socially and academically prepare new 9th graders for arrival in high schools this fall… Our outreach participants included Allie Clark, Jessica Patching-Bunch and…
Bringing Neuroscience to Congress
Christie Pizzimenti, an enthusiastic outreach participant from Behavioral Neuroscience at OHSU, presented in the US Senate this spring during our Noggin “Brains + Art” tour of Washington DC. She just published a guide for the Society for Neuroscience on how best to promote brain science on Capitol Hill! Bringing Neuroscience to Congress NW Noggin is…
The Science of Six Pack @ Velo
“Oh demon alcohol, sad memories I can’t recall,” sang The Kinks, about excessive drinking and the risk of blackouts and other consequences. Rob Oberdorfer, Levi Cecil and Evan Railton of the Neutral Spirits covered the song, along with additional ethanol-related tunes during a Noggin presentation by neuroscientist Andrey Ryabinin on why we imbibe…
Flexing frontal lobes at Floyd Light SUN
We enjoyed some post-Fourth neural fireworks today at Floyd Light Middle School in the David Douglas School District, where middle school students were playing “brain games” this week through Multnomah County’s Schools Uniting Neighborhoods (“SUN”) summer program… Noggin volunteers included Erin McConnell, Alex Voigt, Gaile Parker and Lynette Wolf from Portland State University,…
Society for Neuroscience covers Noggin in DC!
Brief: Outreach Group Spreads Love of Science in the Nation’s Capital Source: Society for Neuroscience With the goal of sharing the joy of science with the world, about two dozen volunteers from the Northwest Neuroscience Outreach Group (Growing in Networks), or NW NOGGIN, came to Washington, DC, recently for a week…
What is outreach like?
“I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands. You need to be able to throw something back.” ―Maya Angelou
Our Northwest Noggin undergraduate and graduate outreach volunteers are enthusiastic and informed, and regularly let knowledge serve by going places, making art, exploring brain research, sharing stories and listening to community questions and interests in urban and rural K-12 public schools, coffee shops, museums, correctional facilities, houseless youth nonprofits, research conferences, Congress and more! LEARN MORE @ What is outreach like?.