Let's party !: ways to interact with the students similar to "Science Meets Speed Dating" My institution would like to organize an event where the students of our university would meet the researchers of our lab(s) and where we could expose what our daily work look like, what are our subjects of interest, what is like being a Researcher, etc....

We're looking for ideas about how to interact with the students. One of our ideas is to do something similar to "Science Meets Speed Dating" http://www.wsj.com/articles/science-meets-speed-dating-1434569915 


  Last week, the American Museum of Natural History and the blogging and
  social networking platform Tumblr decided to adapt the speed-dating
  concept to science.
  
  Instead of getting five minutes with a prospective mate, the allotted
  time would be spent with one of the museum’s scientists. There were 24
  of them, traveling among 12 tables. And instead of sharing your taste
  in food and music and attitudes toward organized religion (or whatever
  people discuss on speed dates), you’d get to pepper paleontologists
  about whether Tyrannosaurus rex had feathers or chat with
  astrophysicists about the possibility of a multiverse and whether
  black holes might serve as portals, sort of like the
  Bleecker-Lafayette subway station, facilitating travel between one
  universe and another.


do you know any similar (funny/original) way(s) to interact with the public ?
Great idea, given that many students have no idea what scientists actually do (and some confuse scientists with full-time teachers; not sure what your students think -- that would be interesting to know in advance to address these misconceptions and to reinforce what is true). And even better to go beyond a simple poster session or the like.

But what exactly should the students take away from the event/this experience? For example,


that science is a weird mixture of great fun (doing something new) to excruciating agony (getting papers/proposals rejected, non-significant results)? Then I'd second a science slam. If you have good speakers who are willing to be open about their success and failures. Personally, I'd go by something "behind the scenes" like. A couple of placed cameras with a fast forward montage of a typical day might be interesting (explaining what you do in the video). And plan some time for questions.
to show specifically what your institution researches? How about something hands-on? Something that shows the progress, not the end result that ends up in papers or text books?


Just, whatever you do, I doubt that anything involving speed would get the message across. Perhaps it's my aversion to speed dating speaking here, but in the end it's all a blur and I wonder whether that fits your goals. I think identifying the misconceptions and specifically replacing them with what you actually do is the way to go, rather than just short and diverse contact that likely will remain superficial.