Marshall University is starting International Brain Awareness week with the seventh annual Brain Expo Friday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Don Morris Room of the Memorial Student Center.

The expo is open for elementary schools, usually grades third through fifth, to attend hands on stations and learn about brain and neuroscience education.

There are different aspects of the brain within the 28 different stations including how to use the brain, how to take care of it and how it works.

Nadja Spitzer, director and cofounder of the MU Brain Expo, said this event is a lot of fun for the kids who attend and the university students who volunteer and work the stations.

“It’s great for the children that come because the university students make a very accessible role model,” Spitzer said.

One of the stations allows the children to wear gloves and touch real animal brains. This gives them hands on interactive learning experience with university students who show them science is for everybody.

Spitzer said the importance of the expo is for children to find interest in science and to learn it is possible to pursue a career in science.

Robert Cooper, biology graduate student, will be attending the event as a returning volunteer. Cooper said as a child his parents helped him fall in love with science and as a volunteer he wants to help other children do the same.

“I think getting kids interested in science is really important because it is fundamental to our lives,” Cooper said. “The world always needs new people thinking about science.”

Cooper said it is the responsibility of scientists to get the next generation interested. The next kid may be the next Albert Einstein, but he or she may not be interested in science yet.

“I would absolutely love to instill that same feeling in kids,” Cooper said. “To give them that moment that all of a sudden science makes sense and that it is way cooler and complex than they ever thought.”

Allyson Carr can be contacted at [email protected].