About

The UBC Physics Olympics is organized jointly by the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the Faculty of Education, and the Department of Physics and Astronomy in the Faculty of Science at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver Campus.

The Organizing Committee is:

  • Aaron Boley, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Andrzej Kotlicki, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Georg Rieger, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Janis McKenna, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Jess McIver, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Kirsty Dickson, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Marina Milner-Bolotin, Dept. of Curriculum & Pedagogy
  • Mike Hasinoff, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy
  • Valery Milner, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy

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2024 Physics Olympics Volunteers:

Fermi Questions / Judge: Petar Simidzija
Volunteers: Audrey Yang, Austin Zhu, Chloe Lawson, Dawn Zhen, Goni Bebzuck Marom, Grace Campbell, Josh Lerner, Minh Lai Nguyen, Nane Vardanyan, Pascale Luers, Santo Neyyan, Stella Wong.

Quizzics / Judge and Emcee: Robin Coope
Volunteers: Arnav Khandelwal, Eamon Sawada-Tse, Emily Millard, Jerome Cho, Kaj Grimstrup, Lorna Tu, Maude Lariviere, Mitchell Halajian, Sajjan Grewal, Taiki Shikele.

Cool it down – Pre-build/ Judge: Valery Milner
Volunteers: Alana Chan, Ari Cholakian, Cecilia Soroco, Marcus Dustin.

Solar-powered car  – Pre-build / Judge: Andrzej Kotlicki
Volunteers: Aiden Magor, Audrey Yang, Cameron McInnes, Charlie Raca, Eamon Sawada-Tse, Elise Phelan, Emily Millard, Jonah Townsend, Joseph Ke, Katelynn Hubenig, Lucia Song, Neil Jadav, Serene Rodrigues, Sihath Dissanayake, Suhayl Patel, Taiki Shekele.

Stay Focused – Lab 2 / Judge: Georg Rieger
Volunteers: Alana Chan, Amanda Arteaga, Elise Phelan, Jiaying Li, Mathew Fu, Matt Pan, Neil Jadav, Raymond Zhang, Sophie Gélinas, Tobias Faehndrich, Wendy Pham, Zachary Mitchell.

The Sound of Science Lab 1 / Judge: Jess McIver
Volunteers: Aiden Magor, Ari Cholakian, Aryana Hosseinkhani, Benedict Sutanto, Cecilia Soroco, Goni Bebzuck Marom, Guillermo, Jerome Cho, Jiaying Li, Jonah Townsend, Joseph Ke, Korna Tu, Lucia Song, Marcus Dustin, Martin Anderson, Olivia Lowe, Raymond Zhang, Saloni Soni, Santo Neyyan, Sierra ford, Sophie Gélinas, Wendy Pham, Xiaoyuan Zhang.

Finals
Volunteers: Airene Ahuja, Arnav Khandelwal, Austin Zhu, Lucia Song, Mathew Fu, Mira Roddy, Sajjan Grewal, Zoe Kartsonas.

Logistics 
Volunteers: Airene Ahuja, Aryana Hosseinkhani, Benedict Sutanto, Blerta Burnaci, Cameron McInnes, Chloe Lawson, Christina Zhou, Down Zheng, Grace Campbell, Guillermo, Ingrid Stairs, Josh Lerner, Katelynn Hubenig, Tadeo Garzon, Lara Mancuso, Kimanthra Reddy, Luka Vance, Marina Milner, Minh Lai, Mira Roddy, Nane Vardanyan, Olivia Lowe, Pascale Luers, Philip Freeman, Saloni Soni, Sierra Ford, Sihath Dissanayake, Suhayl Patel, Tobias Faehndrich, Xiaoyuan Zhang, Zachary Mitchell, Zoe Kartsonas.

We Couldn’t Have Done this Without You!

We have many people we wish to thank for their support and assistance in making this event happen!

First, a giant thank-you to the Physics Olympics Committee: Marina Milner-Bolotin (Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy), Mike Hasinoff (PHAS faculty and co-chair), Andrzej Kotlicki (PHAS faculty and solar-powered car organizer), Valery Milner (PHAS faculty and cooling device organizer), Jess McIver (PHAS faculty and Sound of science Lab organizer), Georg Rieger (PHAS faculty and Optics lab organizer), Petar Simidzija (PHAS PhD student and Fermi Question organizer), Robin Coope (UBC Biomedical Imaging and AI researcher and Quizzics! emcee), Ingrid stairs (PHAS faculty and organizer), Janis McKenna (PHAS faculty and organizer), Tom Mattison (PHAS faculty and organizer), Colin Gay (PHAS faculty, previous Department Head and supporter), Sajjan Grewal (student testing and tech support) and Lucia Song (student testing and administrative support).

As well, we had fantastic support from Jonathan Massey-Allard (PHAS PhD student and instructor), Amali Jambuge (PHAS instructor) and Katelyn Hubenig (PHAS PhD student) for assistance on Fermi and Quizzics! question contributions and editing. 

Finally, we are most thankful for the support of our Department Machine Shop technicians who help us create, fix, modify and develop equipment to test and set up our labs and pre-builds. Many thanks to: Dan Skjaveland, Mark Reynolds, Matt Sluyter, Mladen Bumbulovic, Nick Lemmel and Xiaofeng Hu.