Zhane Yamin, 2025 Mather Policy Intern - National Science Board

Biography

SPS Chapter: University of Michigan
Hey everyone! My name is Zhane Yamin and I’m a junior at the University of Michigan studying Physics with a minor in Complexity Science. I also currently work at Michigan’s student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as co-Editor in Chief. I conduct research in a Quantum Optics lab at Michigan as well.My time as a physics student and as a journalist has made me interested in the intersection between science and the public, including science policy and science communication. The interplay between the development of new technology, their reception by the public and their regulation by the government fascinates me! After graduation, I’m hoping to continue to contribute to the wider field of scientific communication and policy.In my spare time, I love to read non-fiction books, hoop, produce music, and eat food that is a perfect balance of “tastes good” and “bad for your health.” Also my favorite equation is the Dirac equation because it’s pretty. Go blue!

Internship

Host: Mather Policy Intern – National Science Board

Internship Blog

Week 1: The work is mysterious and important

Hello friends, family, and future, present, and past interns.

You may have a lot of questions. I sure do: What does it mean to be alive? Who am I? Is that a Severance reference in the title? Is anything significant in this chaotic, incomprehensible world of ours? Why is Jenna so afraid of birds? Does her fear extend to other winged creatures? And finally, what is an “internship?”

Hopefully by the end of these 10 weeks, I’ll have the answer to at least one of those questions.
First a formal introduction: Hi! My name is Zhane, though some people call me “uhnuisance” (not sure how they got that nickname from Zhane but it’s cool I guess...?). I’m one of the Mather Public Policy Interns this summer and I’m working at the National Science Board (which *clears throat* “establishes the policies of the National Science Foundation and serves as advisor to Congress and the President.”). In a more civilian capacity, I’m going into my senior year at the University of Michigan, where I spend the total extent of my waking life on words (journalism) and symbols (physics).

Work-wise, my first week at the NSB was great! The view from the office is amazing and everyone has been very nice and helpful as I’m getting the hang of things. It’s cool, and a bit daunting, to be surrounded by so many intelligent people. The first few days have mostly been reading and getting to know people, though it sounds like I’m in store for a busy summer.

Of course, I’ve also been getting acquainted with DC and the other interns! The first few days I was getting my bearings and getting over this weird jetlag that I had, even though I didn’t change any time zones (I slept for 12 and half hours straight on Wednesday night). During orientation on Tuesday, Maia, Kalen, JJ and I won the marshmallow-spaghetti tower contest by a sizeable margin. That was lit. I also got a chance to catch up with some UMich/Daily people who are also in DC. That was also lit.

On Friday, we went to the Trimble Lecture, where I learned that the words that describe objectivity in scientific imaging also describe the progression of my life philosophy with a good deal of accuracy (Idealism, Mechanical Objectivity, Trained Judgement). After the lecture, the interns went to Tonic for karaoke. Riley and I made Gloria Gaynor proud. On Saturday, Maia, Jenna and I took on the Natural History Musuem and the Wharf. I got a Glizzy from Shake Shack. My takeaway: Diversification has been good for them. Then I watched Dune with Kavin, Grace, JJ, and James. My takeaway: Oscar Isaac has an amazing beard.

I think that’s all I have for this week. If you haven’t watched Severance, watch it.
- Zhane Y.

Week 2: The largest waterfall in the world

Hello everyone!

I hope you are all doing well I’m reporting in from the 19^th floor of the National Science Foundation, where the elevators are super fancy, and the kitchenette’s are well stocked. This past week went by pretty fast, so let me try to summarize what the deal was.

Pretty much all week I was working from the NSB office. Since I usually get escorted out, I have had some very nice metro ride conversations with my mentor and some other NSB people. I really appreciated those. This past week the busiest, partly because I wanted to get a good amount of work done before I left for San Francisco on Thursday (more on that later). Generally, I was working on some statistical and outreach stuff. I’ve been able to flex my programming muscles a little bit so far, which I wasn’t really anticipating, but it’s been fun to actually USE my skills to complete an actual task instead of a homework assignment. On Wednesday, I carried two of the SPS internship boxes back to the hall ALMOST by myself. Shoutout Maia and Naomi. Y’all are the goat.

Tuesday was by far the busiest day. There were three science policy events on the Hill that I tried to catch and take some notes on. The first was about NSF impacts on community college students, which was really interesting and also there was free lunch but it was also very interesting. I dilly dallied for an hour with some NSB people and then went to t h e s t a t e o f t h e s c i e n c e address given by NASEM (and a panel with an NSB member!). In short, the state of the science is – bad. Though as I always like to say, it’s not bad situation if it gets you somewhere. One time I accidentally didn’t say hi to someone I tangentially knew and then she hated me but then we become very close. Does that sort of premise apply here? Maybe I’ll let Marcia McNutt decide if she reads this.

On a more serious note, I have been learning SO much about science policy. I mean, it is fascinating: What incentives drive certain people to make decisions that would drive certain other people to make other decisions and learning how to balance and amalgamate that into a cohesive message for scientific priorities is pretty spectacular. It seems like we’re at a very interesting time in science policy, so I’m feeling a lot of innovative spirit which I’m very much feeding off of and feel very close to.

Speaking of very close, I left on Thursday to San Francisco to visit some grad schools and some friends for the weekend. I love the Bay Area so I had a great time. There was really good Indian food and really good Mexican food. I also saw the new Wes Anderson Movie (in the front row, so my neck still hurts). That was pretty lit. I also saw a 2 foot tall waterfall. It may very well be the largest waterfall in the world. Anyways, I’ll keep it short for this week. See you soon!

- Zhane Y.

Week 3: Enjoying Each Week Equally
What up SPS!

Some of the interns (a population representative of all rooms within Shenkman, therefore reaching quorum and allowing us to make decisions on behalf of all the interns) and I had a great conversation about some dairy items. Two and a half big takeaways: Maia really hates Vanilla Soy Milk, JJ is particular about his cheese selection, and, as an avid outsourcer of labor, he very well may be paying James to cut his cheese blocks.

Me? I’ve never really been a big cheese block guy. Too unwieldy. I like my food like I like to consume media. Short-form and bite-sized or just slightly larger. I have never been a huge fan of long stuff like TV Shows (which I am classifying as long because the story plays out over 10s of hours, and don’t tell me it’s an episode-by-episode thing because many episodes across many shows are not isolated plotlines). I’ll take my movies and Instagram reels, thank you.

With the storytelling flavor aside, I’m going to tell you all about my week in a non-linear storytelling fashion. So, all this definitely happened, but not in this order.

We celebrated Saniya’s birthday and Maia made a (really good) vanilla cake that definitely used the ingredients that JJ and James got from Target. After coming back from work and being awake for around 26 hours, the dorm bed felt like a commercial mattress, and I snoozed for a very long time. JJ and James also got me toilet paper, so W JJJ. I realized that all the other interns have more hospitable looking rooms than me and Kavin, but that’s okay because it’s our presence that makes it a home. Because of the parade on Saturday, pretty much all NSF staffers worked from home starting Wednesday. I went to the Congressional Baseball game and saw the Republicans absolutely demolish the Democrats. NSB stuff has been chugging along, and I’ve been absolutely killing my To-Do list! I went to the mall with the other interns, and we tossed around a Football, and we (maybe not Maia) lamented the existence of small bugs. Final highlight: Going to the orchestra on Saturday! Super fun experience and hearing Mahler’s 2^nd symphony was truly something I will remember forever and ever and ever and ever.

I hope you enjoyed that Tarantino-style rundown. With all of these things happening, it’s important to remind myself to enjoy each other equally, lest I fail to appreciate them at all. I think that’s it for this blog. Catch y’all next week.

- Zhane Y.