Hartmut Sadrozinski found out what it’s like to be zapped with
bolts of lightning because, he says, he couldn’t hook his
teenage son on physics. “I had a talk with him about science,
but I couldn’t get my story across,” says Sadrozinski, professor
of physics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a
veteran educator. Physics deals in subatomic particles so small
you can’t see them, and electromagnetic fields that you cannot
hear or smell, and distant celestial objects so far away you
can’t even tell they’re there without a powerful telescope. So
how’s a father supposed to get his kid interested in a field
that seems so far removed from everyday life? Easy, Sadrozinski
concluded. Make science, even something as vague as
electromagnetic fields, so real you can see it, and smell it,
and hear it. What a Little Lightning Will Do And to do that, all
you have to do is make every kid’s fantasy come true. Zap the
teacher with bolts of lightning. High school students in
northern California will get a chance to