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Alisa Bettale
Alisa Bettale is the Instruction & Content Manager for Berkeley Lab K-12 STEM Education & Outreach Programs. In her role, she works with researchers and educators to develop curriculum and content that reflects innovative Berkeley Lab research and provides engaging, authentic STEM learning experiences for K-12 students. She is passionate about creating exciting and inclusive educational activities that strengthens students' STEM identity and inspire them to pursue STEM careers. Prior to joining Berkeley Lab, Alisa was a high school physics teacher for five years. Alisa holds a Master's in Education from Harvard Graduate School of Education, a MS in Astronomy from San Diego State University, and a BS in Physics (Astrophysics Track) from Carnegie Mellon University.
Boe Colabewala
Boe Colabewala began her educational career at Orange Coast Community College in Southern California before transferring to California State University at Long Beach to earn her B.S. degree in Physics and continuing on to receive a PhD in Physics from University of California, Merced. She began her teaching career in 2020 teaching physics at Mills College and in 2022 began her current role as a full-time faculty at Los Medanos Community College. Her experiences as a community college student led her to pursue a path that would bring her back to the community college environment where she feels she can best help students thrive and succeed.
William Evans
William Evans is Division Leader of the Physics Division in the Physical & Life Sciences Directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). He received his B.S. for the California Institute of Technology and his S.M. and Ph.D. from Harvard University. His research includes high-pressure physics studying pressure-induced phase transformations and equations of state using optical spectroscopies and synchrotron x-ray approaches. At LLNL he has served in a variety of roles including staff scientist, principal investigator, group leader, programmatic working group lead and division leader. He has published over 100 peer-reviewed manuscripts and has filled service roles for professional societies and foundations.
Shannon Swilley Greco
Shannon Swilley Greco is the Science Education Senior Program Leader at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory at Princeton University. She is a passionate science educator with twenty years of experience in hands-on science and engineering education and engagement programs for informal science education, K-12 students and teachers, and the general public. Ms. Swilley Greco holds a Master of Science in Science Education degree, and her work focuses on increasing the participation of women and minorities in STEM. The YWCA recognized her as a "Woman of Excellence" for her work toward their mission of "Empowering Women and Eliminating Racism." Shannon Swilley Greco is the current Chair of the CU*iP National Organizing Committee Leadership, a Past Chair of the American Physical Society's Forum on Outreach and Engaging the Public, an APS Career Mentoring Fellow, and APS STEP UP Ambassador.
Tammy Ma
Dr. Tammy Ma is the lead for the Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) Initiative at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. She was a member of the team at the National Ignition Facility that achieved fusion ignition in December 2022 — an experiment that, for the first time in history, generated more energy from fusion than the energy it consumed. Tammy serves on the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee, where she helped author a long-range plan for U.S. efforts in fusion and chaired the 2022 IFE Basic Research Needs study. She is the recipient of a Presidential Early Career Award for Science and Engineering, was previously a Young Scientist of the World Economic Forum, and is a fellow of the American Physical Society.
Nathalie Palanque-Delabrouille
Nathalie Palanque-Delabrouille dedicated her career to the study of the Universe, and in particular to that of its invisible and least understood components: dark matter and dark energy. She obtained her PhD in 1997, jointly from the University of Paris 7 and the University of Chicago. She contributed to several cosmology experiments that aim at studying dark energy, among which the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) for which she was co-spokesperson from 2018 to 2024. She led most of her career as a scientist at CEA, a French National Research Lab near Paris. Since 2021, she moved to California where she is now the director of the Physics Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL). She was recipient of the 2017 Irene Joliot-Curie award as the “Woman Scientist of the year”, and was elected in 2020 to the French Academy of Sciences, one of the few women to have received this honor.
Kelly Perce
Kelly has worked in the Berkeley Lab Directorate as a program manager for the last five years. She develops and manages diverse programs and Lab-wide events for learning and awareness, community-building, networking, and wellness. She has extensive experience with marketing, communications, website management and learning and organizational development. Prior to working in the Lab Directorate Office she had seven years of experience working as an administrator with the Energy Analysis & Environmental Impacts Division in the Energy Technologies Area.
Prior to LBL, Kelly worked at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business and College of Natural Resources as well as the non-profit Trust for Public Land in San Francisco. She also spent 15 years working in the outdoor travel industry with Backroads, a Berkeley-based company that offers bicycling and hiking vacations around the world. Among her many roles at Backroads, she was a professional trip leader managing regional operations and trip logistics throughout Europe as well as acting as an interpreter, naturalist and guide for groups.
She earned her undergraduate degree in French Literature from Colgate University in New York and has a Masters in Counseling Psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco. Her favorite place to be is outside hiking, biking, kayaking, cross-country skiing and occasionally snowshoeing.
Margaret Scheiner
Margaret Scheiner, Ph.D., is a functional analyst with the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE). She holds a B.Sc. in Materials Science and Engineering from Cornell University and completed her M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering at Florida State University (FSU). Her doctoral research focused on enhancing polymer composites with triboluminescent materials for structural health monitoring and self-healing capabilities. She conducted additional work with additive manufacturing and ceramic composite materials. She was selected as a U.S. delegate to the 2017 Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting, recognizing her contributions to scientific research and dedication. Dr. Scheiner joined ORISE in 2018 as an educational programs manager for internships and fellowships with DOE’s national laboratory system. In her current role, she leads an overall data strategy for ORISE workforce development programs, including data governance and analysis. Dr. Scheiner contributes to professional development resources such as the annual Ignite Off! Competition and the ORISE Learn platform. She is an active member of several professional organizations, including the National Association of Colleges and Employers and the Society of Women Engineers.
David Rakestraw
David Rakestraw is a senior scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in Livermore, California. For more than a decade, he led multidisciplinary research and development teams to counter chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive threats. Over the past 5 years, he has focused on STEM education where he is developing inquiry-based activities that take advantage of the sensors in smartphones. Prior to LLNL, he spent 12 years at the Sandia National Laboratories location in Livermore, California, where he engaged in a wide range of research and development activities which began with the development of laser-based diagnostics for studying combustion processes. For 6 years between his time at the two national laboratories, Rakestraw co-founded a company that specialized in applying microfluidics for chemical analysis. Rakestraw has a BS in Chemistry from Ohio Northern University and a PhD in Chemical Physics from Stanford University.