All contents of this website © Thom Jones, 2013
Sidney, NY
I will be running a series of three Forensic Science programs in Sidney, NY through the LEAH group. The dates will be November 7, 10, and 14. The programs will run from 10-4. With any series of programs, there is some variation in exactly how much is covered each day, so the descriptions of the information for these programs might have a small amount of change in which day a particular topic is covered.
Day 1: The Big 3 Types of Evidence.
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Fingerprints: The kids will take and classify their own prints, develop latent (invisible) prints with brushes and powders, and see a special crystalline substance that can find prints on the sticky side of non-
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Shoe evidence: This is the forgotten type of evidence for many criminals. We will look at ways to figure out a person’s height and weight from their shoe impressions, we’ll try to figure out what a person was doing by looking at their gait pattern, and we’ll look for clues in shoe prints. We will also talk about the one thing that shoe evidence can tell us that many other types of evidence can’t.
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Blood: First, we use synthetic blood (as used by the FBI) which has a protein that allows us to do blood presence tests. We’ll do the “pink Q tip” test to see if a drop is blood or something else. We’ll also use BlueStar, a liquid that is sprayed on an area where I will wipe off the synthetic blood. The kids will see a chemiluminescent reaction (fancy wording for a bright blue light when the BlueStar touches blood).
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Mock crime scene: We will do a full mock crime scene that will cover the types of evidence that we get through on the first day.
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Day 2: More Evidence.
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Written evidence: We will look at handwriting. The kids will try to use fake handwriting, and we’ll learn how hard that is in real life. We will also look at what is written down to get clues about the person who wrote it. We will also do ink chromatography, which will allow the kids to break ink apart into its constituent colors. Finally, we will likely look at paper under a microscope to see how even copy paper varies by brand.
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Tool marks: What can a tool mark tell us? The kids will match tools to the marks they make. We will look at different ways to match a tool to a particular mark.
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Hair: We will look at hair under a microscope and talk about what makes each person’s hair different. We will also talk about the types of evidence that we can get from hair. Finally, we will look at hair from some different animals to see how we can distinguish between human and animal hair at a scene.
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Bugs, Soil, Plants, and Pollen: We will look at ways that other sciences are used in forensic science.
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Glass: We may look at glass under a microscope to figure out which side it was hit on, in order to make it break. We will also look at pictures from an electron microscope of glass and wires to find important evidence.
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Mock crime scene: The second mock crime scene will contain evidence types from both days.
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Day 3: Bones and such.
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Forensic anthropology: We will look at bones and learn not only about bones, but what they can tell us in forensic science.
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“Other” evidence: We will cover any bits that we didn’t cover the first two days.
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History: We will look at the ways that detectives consider history when looking at old cases.
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Mock crime scene: We will examine evidence from a mock archaeological dig at an early American colony. We will try to figure out who these skeletons were based on clues about bones and the colony’s records. This is a really fun activity that surprises a lot of people who don’t know about the connection between forensic science and archaeology.
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There are two different registration sections below. The first is for Sidney LEAH members who are using the group’s scholarships. The fees in these boxes represent a $25 per child reduction in the fees. The remaining amount is being paid by the group’s scholarship fund.
The second section is for anyone who is not using a scholarship. This includes some members of the Sidney LEAH group and any person who registers who is not a member of that group.
NON-SCHOLARSHIP REGISTRATION: The registration tabs below are for families who are not using one of the group’s scholarships or are not members of the Sideny LEAH group.
SIDNEY LEAH SCHOLARSHIP REGISTRATION: