At the 2010 IEEE International Symposium on EMC, we built electric field antennas and magnetic pick up devices during the children’s technical program. Prior to the children constructing their own antennas, a short training session was given by Duane Bagdons from International Certification Services to teach them a little about antennas and the differences between the electric fields and magnetic fields. The children were divided into teams of two people and each team created their own electric field antenna design. When all the antennas were constructed, we connected them to a spectrum analyzer that was loaned to us by Washington Labs and compared the reception of each antenna. The team with the best reception was declared the winner.
     The next day, the children built magnetic field antennas. This time, each child built their own device. The pickup units were all wound on ferrite cores donated to the program by Fair-Rite Products Corp. After the children built their magnetic field antennas, we tested them using the spectrum analyzer and a noise source. Once again, the antenna with the best pick up was declared the winner.
     The third and final day of the program, we took all the children for a tour of the exhibits in the exhibit hall. We stopped at various booths, including Tektronix, AR RF/Microwave Instrumentation, HV Technologies, and ETS-Lindgren, to name a few. Company personnel at each booth gave a brief description of what they were selling and why. After each booth visit, the company generously gave the children a small gift.
     Thank you to the committee supporting this program, to the exhibitors who provided tours of their respective booths and donated or loaned products, and to Gayla Burns from International Certification Services for her help in getting the children started in building their antennas. This help was greatly appreciated!
     Thank you all for helping make this program a success for the budding engineers at EMC 2010!                EMC