How to Teach Physics to [Your Pet’s Name Here] (DonorsChoose Challege 2010)

As you may or may not be aware, we are once again in the middle of a DonorsChoose fundraiser to support public school students and teachers. The good news is, the Uncertain Principles entry for the 2010 Challenge is in second place among ScienceBlogs blogs with $373 in donations thus far; the bad news it that more than half of that money is from the initial contribution I made when I set the challenge up.

We’ve done much better than this in the past, but I realize these are tough economic times, and people may not have as much disposable cash to give to charity. I was thinking, though, about ways I could sweeten the pot, as it were, and I hit on one: I can offer to Tuckerize your pets.

So, here’s the deal:

I will name two animals in the relativity book-in-progress after the pets of people who donate to the Challege: one for the largest individual donation, and one to a donor chosen at random.

What does this mean? Well, the current book is about relativity, which means that it is largely about ways to reconcile the observations of different observers who are moving relative to one another. This means that in addition to Emmy, the examples given in the book include some other dogs, several cats, and at least one bird. At the moment, none of them have names, but there’s no reason they couldn’t be named– in How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, I had cameo appearances by Kate’s parents’ Boston Terrier, Truman, and my parents’ Labrador Retreiver, RD.

So, what I am offering in exchange for a donation is this: I will name one of the additional observer animals after your pet, if you make a donation. Simply contribute to the challenge via the link above, and forward the confirmation email from DonorsChoose to the address at the Contact: tab above. At the end of the challenge on November 9th, I will choose the two winners– the largest individual donation, and one donor chosen at random from all entries. Each person will get a signed copy of How to Teach Physics to Your Dog, and can send me the name and some information about a pet of their choosing, who I will use as one of the observers in the forthcoming sequel, tentatively titled What to Tell Your Dog About Einstein, or something like that.

This is in addition to the other offers already made, so a $20 donation entitles you to ask one question to be answered in a blog post, and also gets you entered into the drawing for the signed book and Tuckerization. The references to the winning pet will be done in a manner of my choosing, though I’ll try to keep Emmy from saying anything too snarky about what she will undoubtedly regard as her inferiors.

Here’s your chance to win your pets fame and, well, not fortune, but, you know, fame’s pretty good, right? And as a bonus, your donation will go to support the education of needy kids, which is pretty cool in its own right.