The CTC Lecture Series is sponsored by the Winchester Savings Bank in partnership with the Winchester Foundation of Educational Excellence.
“As a community bank, we believe Winchester Savings Bank has a responsibility to help families learn money management skills that will last a lifetime. We believe in educating children and young adults about the importance of saving and managing their money. One of the greatest gifts we can give a child is to teach financial responsibility at a young age.
Part of that commitment is support of our local schools and the technologies that will drive our industry and our lives going forward. Winchester Savings is very excited to be a sponsor of the Creative Technology Center Speaker Series at Winchester High School.”
Peter Segerstrom, President and CEO, Winchester Savings Bank.
Upcoming Speakers
Wednesday, April 10, 2019
WinBlock Lecure and Workshop
Beth Galston – Expressing Nature
Beth Galston is a sculptor who builds architecturalscale environments based on interest in light and the quality of space. Trained at MIT, Ms. Galston’s art has been exhibited throughout the US. Check out her work at her website: www.bethgalston.com
CTC Lecure Series Speakers
2018-19 Speakers
January 30, 2019
BlocksCAD Workshop
- Are you interested in learning how to create images in 3D?
- Have you wanted to learn to use Computer Aided Design or CAD software?
Then come to the CTC Lecture Series BlocksCAD workshop.
BlocksCAD is a block-based programming interface that allows you to spend less time getting started using CAD allowing you to start designing more quickly.
The BlocksCAD workshop took place during WIN Block on Wednesday, January 30th in the Video Editing Mac Lab in E Wing.
January 9, 2019
Joe Davis – Ad Archaea ad Astra
Joe Davis’ Creative Technology Lecture ‘Ad Archaea ad Astra’ addressed his study of ancient organisms such as salt crystals and meteorite and how he uses ‘junk’ DNA material to uncover creative opportunities that blend science and art. Joe just got back from Moscow where he shared his transgenic and metalized silks that were inspired by spider webs. He is excited about a newly minted project with the German cultural ministry for the creation of a (his words) “temporary institute for the unification of knowledge”. Joe currently teaches at Harvard.
December 12, 2018
John Gregg- Programming for a living:
what they don’t teach you at school.
John Gregg returned to Winchester High School to talk about what a career in computer programming is actually like. Mr. Gregg has been a programmer for more than 30 years and has great insight into the career.
November 15, 2018
Wade Roush – Podcasting Workshop November 15th
Wade Roush returned to Winchester High School to give a workshop on podcasts. Mr. Roush is s a Cambridge-based technology journalist and independent audio producer. His podcast, Soonish is about the future and what we can do to shape it. It is a great listen.
For news and previews follow @soonishpodcast on Twitter.
Eric Klopfer- November 1st, 2017
2:30 pm in the Creative Technology Center.
( Bio from Wikipedia) Eric Klopfer is a professor and Director of the SchellerTeacher Education Program and the Education Arcade at MIT. Klopfer’s research explores how educational technology, games, and computer simulations can be tools for teaching complex systems and developing cognitive and computational thinking skills. Klopfer and his research group developed StarLogo and App Inventor for Android and other Visual programming language platforms that build on the work of Seymour Papert and the Constructionism (learning theory) in education. He is also the principal investigator in the research and development of award-winning games designed for building understanding in science and math – connecting game play with scientific practice, problem-solving, and real world issues.
Wade Roush – Podcasting Workshop November 20th
(From WBUR) Wade Roush is a Cambridge-based technology journalist and independent audio producer. In January 2017 he will launch Soonish, a podcast about the future and what we can do to shape it; for news and previews follow @soonishpodcast on Twitter.
John Gregg- Programming for a living: what they don’t teach you at school.
Wednesday Dec 16th 2:30-3:30 WHS Library.
Aurelio Ramos – January 24th during WIN block.
( Bio from the Together Festival) Aurelio Ramos is a Boston Based producer, DJ, audio engineer and tech artist. Formally trained in Puerto Rico as a Computer Engineer, his technical contributions cover a wide gamut, from Digital Signal Processing to a large scale interactive art installation
, Video Bleep, featured in Boston Common’s First Night as well as Burning Man. Holder of 9 audio patents (and growing) Aurelio has a deep love for building things, learning, teaching, and sharing. With contributions in desktop music production such as iZotope’s Ozone, Sonar and Z3TA, his love
for creation has left a mark, both in his local community and the world of music production / digital Hi-Fi.
Chris Fitch- How puppeteering has influenced the foundation of computer science lecture- April 11th
9:30 am – 10:30 am in the Auditorium
Chris Fitch is a sculptor and inventor in the Boston area. Beyond his work in sculpture, his creative reach has touched upon stop motion animation, science museum exhibits, design of teaching tools for science and math education, and independent invention. Most recently he completed an electronic sculpture for the Inventions Gallery at the Hartford Science Center. He also recently appeared with a state of the art miniature puppet theater he created for a touring production of Peter and the Wolf, first performed in 2008 at Walt Disney Hall with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. On the heels of that performance, he continued his exploration of new forms of puppetry for Stravinsky’s Petrouchka with the University of Maryland Symphony and for a production of Brecht’s Life of Galileo with MIT and the Underground Railway Theater. It is safe to say that the arc of his professional trajectory has been more like a giant squiggle than an arc. He has engineered and built automated production machines for a toy factory
, run an “emergency amusement” company with his brother, building things like a giant fly that exploded through the wall of a nightclub and zoomed around the ceiling at 25 mph, or staging things like a shark attack at a fancy restaurant. He led the model and stopmotion puppet making division of a major animation company for six years, designed a physics playground, hit the streets of France with a two-man junk band with instruments made from French trash, has designed landscapes, built outdoor fountains, designed residential furniture and lighting, built architectural models, studied music in West Africa, invented fasteners, toys, and armature systems for the animation industry, done some (nonunion) screen acting, built chain-reaction Rube Goldberg installations, and conducted workshops about kinematics and foam latex stop motion puppetry. He has also eaten tarantulas and scorpions, sea centipedes, hammerhead sharks, roasted locusts, and other experimental foods, chased a solar eclipse across the Peruvian high desert, co-owned a tree house bed-and-breakfast inn in the Philippines, collected jungle orchids in southeast Asia, spelunked underground rivers with nothing but a flashlight, and can throat sing like a Tuvan cowboy.
Meghan Doyle/Fashion Designer – Founder of Tallulah & Poppy – February 28th in the CTC/Library
Tallulah & Poppy
is a women’s apparel brand founded on the premise of slow fashion, with an emphasis on quality workmanship and timeless design.
Camera Making Workshop -Lina Maria Giraldo- April 5th and 6th with Advanced Photography.
Lina Maria Giraldo is Colombia-born, Boston-based Artist. She creates screen based, computer-generated work using video, photography, physical computing and data. Her work incorporates contemporary languages such as video games, advertising, repetition, and massiveness. Crucial for the development of her pieces is the community’s role and the information it generates. This is why over 15 years her work has been focused on creating messages where she depicts the fragility of our environment, community equality, and immigration concerns, exploring the questions of being Latino in the US. Lina truly believes in the power of contemporary art through digital storytelling in public spaces.
Lina Maria Giraldo’s artistic career has revolved around generating educational work that has been exhibited in many Universities, Museums and public spaces such as Fitchburg Museum, The JFK Library, Fenway 30 seconds Cinema, The Art on the Marquee at Boston Exhibition Convention Center just to name a few. Notable achievements include being part of the team that created the award-winning educational website JFK50.org, NEFA Creative City Grant, Artist in Residency for the City of Boston “AIR residency 2.0”, recipient of a Hispanic Scholarship Foundation Grant, and St Botolph Emerging Artist Award. Lina was cited by the city of Boston for her work generating awareness on the dangers of heroin use.
Lina Maria Giraldo holds a Master of Professional Studies on Interactive Telecommunications (ITP) from Tisch School of the Arts at New York University where she was the recipient of both the Paulette Godard and the Tisch School Scholarships. She was awarded the Tsongas Scholarship at Massachusetts College of Art and Design, where she majored in Studio of interrelated Media (SIM)with Departmental Honors and Academic Distinction.
VJ Zebbler – Video Mapping on Sculpture April 25th – ALL DAY and May 2nd from 9:30 am – 10:30 am
( Bio from Wikipedia) Zebbler (Peter Berdovsky) is a visual artist, video jockey and the founder of Zebbler Studios, who is known for his work with Shpongle, EOTO, and Zebbler Encanti Experience. Originally from Belarus, Berdovsky graduated from Arlington High School in Arlington, Massachusetts in 1999 before completing a degree at Massachusetts College of Art and Design in 2006.
His first “Shpongletron” design earned him recognition as one of the first VJs to incorporate 3-D video mapping into his set designs.
Past Speakers
Shizuo Mukai, MD –May 8th 2017 –Tinkering in the Retina “Garage” to Make Inexpensive Retinal Imaging Systems
This story starts in 2004 when one of the ophthalmology trainees with an engineering background and I got together to think about and to build prototypes of inexpensive photography systems to image the retina using standard digital cameras. The medical devices for this are very expensive (upwards of 200K) and cumbersome, and the need was an inexpensive, portable system. The early trials taught us a great deal about the fundamentals of retinal photography, illumination, and digital camera control, as well as the differences in the way engineers (my student) and design people (me) think and approach problems.
The improvement in smartphone cameras allowed for use of the phone as the retinal camera. It was also useful as image-recording devices attached to existing ophthalmic instruments or simply as an image-transfer device of photographs taken with a retinal camera. We devised a minimalist system that can be used almost anywhere in the world. Indeed, the technique was successfully taught even in remote countries such as Uganda, Madagascar, India, and Haiti as well as being used effectively for telemedicine and documentation at home here at the Harvard hospitals. The technique was modified for use in experimental animals including rabbits and mice, both being very important in eye research.
Another smartphone-based approach, an app for automated diagnosis of eye conditions that cause a white pupil on snapshots, was conceived by a father of one of my patients that had such a condition. Since one of the conditions is a cancer of the retina in young children called retinoblastoma, early detection is critical. Using machine learning by analyzing thousands of images with and without the white pupil, an app was developed that is free and available on both iPhone and Android platforms. The app can either evaluate the image live or carry out monthly reviews of all photos in
your album. We are currently in discussion with Facebook to create a system that would screen the photographs on social media.
Most retinal cameras require the pupil of the eye to be dilated with eye drops. To address the need for an inexpensive, portable, retinal camera that does not require pharmacologic dilation, we built a working prototype camera using the Raspberry Pi® single-board computer with total material cost of $180. We are currently building a dongle to attach the device to a smartphone that would decrease the cost to half and allow Internet and phone-platform access for telemedicine.
Finally, the process has been a lot of fun, and it has taught us tremendously about medical device development. To motivate my students to develop new innovations, a prize was created consisting of an engraved retinal lens, publication in the Digital Journal of Ophthalmology, and funds to develop the innovation.
Nathalie Miebach March 8th, 2017
Jeff Lieberman- February 15th, 2017
Jeff Lieberman explores the connections between the arts, sciences, education, passion, creativity, and the potential future of human consciousness. He hosts ‘Time Wa
rp’ on the
Discovery Channel, composes music in the duo gloobic, and shows technological sculptures around the world.
Lieberman finished four degrees at MIT (BS: Physics, Math, MS: Mech. Engineering, Media Arts and Sciences)
Jeff Lieberman, an MIT-trained artist, scientist and engineer, makes a scientific argument for mystical experience. He asks us to challenge our perception of what we are, our relationship to the universe, and our relationship to one another.
Jared Mezzocchi- January 17th, 2017
Jared Mezzocchi received his MFA in Performance and Interactive Media Arts at Brooklyn College. He is currently on faculty at University of Maryland, College Park, where he leads the projection design track in the MFA Design program. He is a resident artist at Woolly Mammoth Theater Company in DC and has directed and/or designed at theaters across the U.S. and in Europe including designing for Big Art Group and their productions of The People (San Francisco CA), The Sleep (Berlin, Germany, and NYC), Cityrama (Torino, Italy), SOS (NYC, Vienna Festival). He has worked for The Builders Association (Jet Lag), Rob Roth (Screen Test) and UTC #61 (Hiroshima: Crucible of Light, Velvet Oratorio, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep), 3Legged Dog (Downtown Loop); Jared made his off-broadway debut at Manhattan Theater Club with his projection design in VIETGONE, written by Qui Nguyen and directed by May Adrales. Regionally, Jared has also worked at Arena Stage, Studio Theater, Theater J, Centerstage Baltimore, Olney Theater, Everyman Theater, Cleveland Playhouse, Milwaukee Rep, South Coast Rep, and The Wilma.
In 2012 he received the prestigious Princess Grace Award, the first projection designer to be honored with this national theater award. In 2017, he recieved the first Lucille Lortel Award for the category of Outstanding Projection design (Vietgone, Manhattan Theater Club). Alongside the Lucille Lortel, Mezzocchi was also a recipient of a 2017 Obie Award, and 2017 nominee for an Outer Critics Circle Award and a Drama Desk Award.
In Spring 2017, Mezzocchi was accepted as a fellow to the MacDowell Colony.
Mezzocchi grew up in Hollis, NH, where his mother still lives and where he will make his summer home as Producing Artistic Director of Andy’s Summer Playhouse. He has been a regular artist at Andy’s since 2009, directing such original productions as The Lost World, The BFG, The Block and others. His production of The Lost World, written originally for Andy’s, won Best Original Play in the NHTA Awards and just received its DC premiere at University of Maryland in 2015.
Andrew Hlynsky (on going workshops) Musical Mad Scientist who creates strange instruments and auditory installations.
The goal of the workshops
to demonstrate how electronic music can integrate and enhance interdisciplinary STEAM practices. Andrew Hlynsky will be discussing the harmonic series, music theory, digital to analog converters, binary data, sample rates and demonstrate how an understanding of all of these things can help you to compose music using the audio software Ableton Live Suite.
Deren Guler – November 22nd, 2016 – Crafting Wearables Workshop
We are very excited to welcome WHS alumn, Deren Guler. Deren is the author of Crafting Wearables and founder of Tekniko, an educational electronics toolsets for building and activating toys, gadgets, and wearables.
Deren will lead a hands-on workshop on wearable electronics.
Brian Knep November 9th, 2016
Our first lecture will be held Wednesday, November 9 in the WHS Library from 2:30 – 3:30 PM. We will feature artist Brian Knepwhose work explores artificial intelligence, biology, engineering, and art.
Brian’s ‘Healing Series’ “are interactive floor projections with patterns that change in response to visitors. When visitors walk across, the patterns pull away, creating wounds. When left alone, the patterns grow to cover these wounds. In each of the pieces, however the patterns grow back in different ways.” (From Brian’s website)
WHS Learning Commons 