Life at Fermilab

1
Life at Fermilab

• Debbie Harris
• With the help of
• Borys Jurkiw, Marilyn Smith,
• Jean Guyer, Patti Hedrick,
• Beth Witherell
• Visual Media Services
• Witherell Symposium
• July 14, 2005

2
Why am I giving this talk?

• Certainly there are many at the lab who know Mike
  better than I do
• Hugh Montgomery
• Marilyn Smith
• Your name here
• Ive been assigned this year to translate what it
  means to do physics to the general public (see
  Quantum Diaries)
• Today I am supposed to translate what it means to
  have a life at Fermilab to the general
  symposium-goer

3
Current Systematic Biases(not necessarily in
order of importance)

• Experimentalist
• Fermilab Employee, not User
• Management Responsibilities
• Married
• Part of a two-career couple
• Parent of a young child (2, actually)

Note Biases are uncorrected in this talkbut
Mike has the same biases
4
What I will not cover

• There are many programs out there that comprise
  Life at Fermilab, many of which Mike and I both
  missed

New recreation programs over past 6 years
Yoga, Scuba Tai Chi, Pilates Womens Self
Defense Country Line Dance
Ultimate Frisbee League Table Tennis League Go
Club Rocket Club
Public Lectures, Fine Art Series, International
Movie Night
5
Stages of an Experiment

• Mission Need and Funding Profile
• Project Baseline
• RD
• Collaboration Building
• Construction (not covered here)
• Calibration/Commissioning
• Safety Concerns
• Running
• Decommissioning
• Publications

6
Mission Need and Funding Profile

• 1998 Mike and Beth Witherell decide to adopt a
  child
• Early 1999 Mike is offered job as director
• March 1999 Mike introduced to the Fermilab
  community in a press conference
• Starts his speech I am really excited about
  this new job
• Thanks Northern Illinois University for their
  agreement to take on the Thoreau Edition so
  that Beth could continue her work as
  Editor-in-Chief

March 1999
7
Project is Baselined

• July 1, 1999 Mikes first day as director
• November 1999 Mike and Beth get referral from
  Viet Nam(schedule delay due to external
  politics)
• January 2000 Mike and Beth bring Lily home to
  Fermilab
• 6800 open acres of land in your back yard
• Childrens Center at Fermilab

Feb. 2000
8
RD Phase and Collaboration Building

• Witherell started his first year by trying to
  learn more about Fermilab scientists
• Dinners at Chez Leon with groupsof roughly 20
  people this must have been about 20 nights
  of research!

May 2001
9
Focused RD Phase

• In 2000 Mike decided to talk to women staff
  scientists at the Lab
• At thattime the numbers seemed a bit low

In Mikes tenure, all fractionshave increaseda
little
Data courtesy Borys Jurkiw
10
Where are the women engineers?
I leave this as an exercise for the new director

• From Howard Georgi, October 20, 2004 colloquium
  fractions of women in physics and engineering are
  comparable, retention rate comparable

PhDs Granted
Fraction of Women ()
Source Society of Women Engineers, NSF and
Census Data
11
Calibration and Commissioning

• Lily learns to sit up, crawl, and walk, and talk
  on site, (most likely) at Fermilab Childrens
  Center

5/2002
8/2000
6/2001, 517PM
12
Level 2 Managers
WBS Coordinator Years Task
1.1 Pam Lee 12 Transition Region
1.2 Cindy Kane, Janet Jelonek 16, 5 Waste Management, Humor Retention
1.3 Mary Robbins 11 Hazard Mitigation
1.4 Sue Hardy 20 Acoustics
1.5 Patty Hedrick Mary Simmons 25, 12 Methodology
Pam
Not all managers shown here.
Sue and Mary S
Janet and Cindy
Mary R
13
Evening and Owl Shifts

• The collaboration expanded over the years to
  include more than Mike and Beth and the
  Childrens Center

3/2005
Primary Shifter Agnieszka Andrzejczyk On-Call
List Nathalie and Jay Witherell Building
Manager Kathy Uhrich (not shown)
11/2000
5/2003
14
First Measurement Value of a good party

• Inspired by Lily, Mike soon learns the important
  effects of a good party best when applied often

8/1/2001 (MCR) 5/3/2002 (MiniBooNE) 6/8/2002
(Leons 80th bday) 11/21/2003 (Labwide) 3/4/2005
(NUMI labwide) 6/1/2005 (Day Care 25th) 6/24/2005
(fb-1 toast) Holiday parties
15
Safety Concerns

• Coincident with Lilys learning to walk, in
  2000-1 we saw
• Wilson Hall Safety Construction
• Baby-proofing the directors house
• Safety takes a front seat

16
DASTOW 1998
17
DASTOW 1999
18
DASTOW 2000
19
DASTOW 2001
20
DASTOW 2002
21
DASTOW 2003
22
DASTOW 2004
23
DASTOW 2005
24
DASTOW Photo Participation
25
Asymptotic Freedom
2001
2002
2003
2004
As measured in Mike-Lily Distance in DASTOW photo
26
Decommissioning

• Childrens Center GraduationJune 2005
• Todays festivities

27
Signs that Mike is not the only one doing this
experiment

• Day Care Enrollmentat any one time enrollment is
  about 50 children, there is always a waiting list
• Summer Camp Enrollment35 slots this year, always
  with a waiting list of 8 to 15!

28
Publications

• Mike will return to UCSB, as Vice Chancellor of
  Research
• Lilly will start at Montessori
• Comment from teachers there progressed through
  1st grade reading level (thanks to Childrens
  Center kindergarten program)
• Beth has moved the Thoreau Edition (all 11,000
  poundsgained 1000 pounds!) back to UCSBremains
  Editor-in-Chief(see www.thoreau.niu.edu )

29
Thank you Mike and Beth, for showing us

• You can raise a child and be director of a Lab at
  the same time
• Need good child care!
• You can find good jobs when youre part of a
  2-carreer couple
• Need institutions in the area who understand the
  problem!
• You can admit all this in public
• Fermilab should be an example to the rest of the
  world on these issues
• Not there yet, but you brought these issues to
  the front page