Where is NW Noggin?
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.
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NW Noggin: Art + Brains
Tres Escuelas en un Día!
Blue Mountain Brains!
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 brain research, make art (including arpilleras, woven depictions of events 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: Arte y Cerebros en Chile LEARN MORE: ARTS & BRAINS IN CHILE
I am thankful…for my brain!
An enthusiastic band of Noggin volunteers met an exuberant and well-informed classroom of 4 and 5 years olds this morning, who had been eagerly learning, and singing, about their changing brains! Kindergarten teacher Kelsey Day welcomed us into her friendly classroom at WSU Vancouver, where students already knew all about…
Final Day @ Fort: Brain Dissections!
Friday marked the exciting and yet sorrowful conclusion of NW Noggin’s program at Fort Vancouver High School. We are going to miss our students! Volunteers started slow with a brief re-cap of brain lobe function as well as neuroanatomy terms that assist in navigating the brain, such as rostral and…
Beethoven, Brains, and Bloody Mary’s
NW Noggin partnered with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra to present on music and the brain on Thursday, December 3rd, at the Brickstone Ballroom in downtown Vancouver… We arrived before dawn, to set up our brain display, and enjoy an excellent breakfast… Both the Brickstone and Symphony made us feel exceptionally welcome, with table centerpieces…
Puppets @ PSU: Teaching science through art
NWNOGGIN joined Sarah Morgan and her class of enthusiastic Art in the Elementary School students at Portland State University this week to discuss the importance of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Mathematics) education and the power of art in education. Joseph Cornell “Habitat Group for a Shooting Gallery” We talked…
Trapper Motivation: Learning about drugs and the brain
NW Noggin returned for our third Trapper Friday at Fort Vancouver High School, where at first we saw (unsurprisingly, at 7:30am ?) a sea of tired faces. However, the excitement grew as students realized that “the brain people are back!” Some students, of course, still weren’t impressed. Yet as the tardy bell rang, one…
NW Noggin awarded grant from US Bank Foundation!
NW Noggin was just awarded $5000 from the US Bank Foundation to continue our STEAM outreach work in Portland and Vancouver. The money will allow us to purchase art supplies, sheep brains, and other educational items critical to our efforts, and better support our student participants from WSU Vancouver, PSU, OHSU and…
Week Two: Frontal Lobes @ Fort
Post written by Rosie Salice, one of the NW Noggin undergraduate teaching leads at Fort Vancouver… We focused on neurons and synapses in our second week at Fort Vancouver High School, introducing nine separate classes to the “classical” neurotransmitters, and their roles in alertness, movement, motivation, and aspects of cognition… Students…
In Dialogue with Art and Drugs @ PAM
Jeff Leake and Bill Griesar presented a two hour workshop on art, drugs and the visual brain at the Portland Art Museum on Sunday, as part of the “In Dialogue” series associated with the “Seeing Nature” exhibit, which runs through January 10, 2016… Here are the slides from the talk, which…
A Brain Bonanza @ Fort Vancouver High!
Early Friday morning, a host of NW Noggin volunteers converged on Fort Vancouver High School with one thing on their minds: Brains! It was the first in a series of four outreach sessions planned for the school over the next month, and scores of students jumped at the chance to…
Presenting Noggins @ PeaceHealth
Our NW Noggin participants delivered a sunrise presentation at WSU Vancouver this morning, as part of the Jay D. Miller Conference on best practices in health communication for the Neuroscience caregiver… The conference was supported by WSU Vancouver, and organized by PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center, with a focus on faculty in…
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?.