02.08.07

Lindsay Crouch
757-864-3189

RELEASE: 07-011

NASA SELECTS NORTHWOODS PARK MIDDLE TO EXPERIMENT ABOARD THE 'WEIGHTLESS WONDER'



HOUSTON - NASA has selected Northwoods Park Middle School, in 
Jacksonville, N.C., to fly their school's experiment aboard the 
agency's reduced gravity aircraft, the "Weightless Wonder," a 
modified McDonnell Douglas DC-9.



Northwoods Park was one of 20 NASA Explorer School (NES) teams 
selected for this unique experience, which will give teachers the 
sensation of flying in space as the aircraft carefully executes a 
series of parabolic maneuvers. To produce each parabola, the DC-9 
will make a steep climb followed by an equally steep dive, creating 
about 25 seconds of weightlessness.



The teachers and students are working on the design and construction 
of their proposed project to get it flight-ready. Once complete, 
Angie Kautter, sixth grade math and science teacher; Regina Carroll, 
sixth grade science and social studies teacher; Peggy Pullicino, 
seventh grade science teacher; Roger Phillips, eighth grade science 
teacher; and Wick Bode, sixth grade math and science teacher, will 
travel to NASA's aircraft facility at Ellington Field and the Johnson 
Space Center in Houston.



The Northwoods Park Middle School teachers will arrive at Ellington on 
Feb. 11 to prepare for their flight that week. Following their 
flight, the teachers will be able to share their experiences and 
immediate findings with their students back at home via video 
conferencing technology through NASA's Digital Learning Network.



The school was selected a NASA Explorer School in 2004, giving the 
school an opportunity to propose a reduced-gravity experiment. The 
program, which now has 175 teams nationwide, allows schools and their 
communities to work with NASA in a three-year partnership to develop 
the nation's future science, technology, engineering and mathematics 
work force.



Northwoods Park's experiment, Blackbeard's Jewel Box, will explore 
gravity and buoyancy. Gravity is a force that causes mass in the 
universe to be attracted to all other mass. Bouyancy is an upward 
force on an object immersed in a fluid, enabling it to float. The 
team has designed an experiment to closely observe and calculate 
these forces.



Four standard size drinking water bottles filled with Karo syrup and 
each containing a mass-measured tube with a known air space will be 
placed in a glovebox and flown within NASA's DC-9 reduced gravity 
aircraft during parabolic flight to illustrate the interactions 
between variable gravity and force due to gravity. The team will 
issue a final report three months after the flight that analyzes the 
experiment's effectiveness, scientific findings and what conclusions 
were drawn from those results.



With this program, NASA continues the Agency's tradition of investing 
in the Nation's education programs. It is directly tied to the 
Agency's major education goal of attracting and retaining students in 
science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, 
disciplines. To compete effectively for the minds, imaginations and 
career ambitions of America's young people, NASA is focused on 
engaging and retaining students in STEM education programs to 
encourage their pursuit of educational disciplines critical to NASA's 
future engineering, scientific and technical missions.



For more information on NASA Explorer Schools on the Internet, go to:

<div 
align="center">http://explorerschools.nasa.gov/portal/site/nes/</div> 


For more information on other NASA Reduced Gravity Programs, call 
Debbie Nguyen of NASA Johnson Space Center at 281-483-5111, or visit 
the Web at:

<div align="center">http://microgravityuniversity.jsc.nasa.gov</div

	
-end-