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Voyages in Education and Public Outreach

An Office of Space Science Newsletter

January 2004 Issue 10

On the Inside

Updates 2

Awards 5

Exhibits: “The Sun as Art” 6

Education Products: “Staying Cool” 6

Education Programs 7

 Messenger Educator Fellows

 Rutgers Astrophysics Institute

 Journey to the Beginning of Time

 Chandra/GEAR UP

 Imagine Mars

 Wyoming Astronomy Camp

 Educator Workshops

Support Network Profile 11

 Sun-Earth Connection Education Forum

On the Horizon 12

MUCERPI-2003 Awards Announced

Phil Sakimoto, NASA Headquarters

The second series of awards in NASA’s

Minority University and College Education and

Research Partnership Initiative in Space Science

(MUCERPI) program was announced in

September 2003. The MUCERPI program is an

Office of Education and Office of Space Science

(OSS) initiative to actively engage minority

institutions in developing substantial space

science capabilities leading to active and full

participation in major OSS science and education

programs. This year’s selections include eight

Historically Black Colleges and Universities

(HBCU), five Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI),

two Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCU), and

one Minority-Predominant Institution (MPI).

All institutions will improve their academic

capabilities in space science at various levels in

the educational system, including 14 who are

developing undergraduate courses or degree

programs, 3 who are developing graduate courses

or degree programs, 13 who are developing

precollege outreach or teacher training programs,

and 6 who are engaging in Public Outreach

activities. Eight of these institutions will also be

developing research capabilities in space science

through partnerships with major space science

research institutions.

Each of the MUCERPI-2003 awards is a threeyear grant of up to $275,000 per year over the

period from January 1, 2004, to December 31, 2006.

More than 50 major OSS-sponsored research or

educational institutions will be active partners in

these projects. The awardees are -

HBCU’s:

Alabama A&M University, Dr. Arjun Tan

Fisk University, Dr. Arnold Burger

Hampton University, Dr. M. Patrick McCormick

Norfolk State University, Dr. Carlos W. Salgado

North Carolina A&T State University,

Dr. Abebe Kebede

South Carolina State University,

Dr. Donald K. Walter

Southern University, Baton Rouge,

Dr. J. Gregory Stacy

University of the District of Columbia,

Dr. Abiose O. Adebayo

HSI’s:

California State University at Los Angeles,

Dr. Charles W. Liu

California State University at San Bernadino,

Dr. Susan Lederer
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Updates Updates

Venus Transit 2004

Troy Cline, Sun-Earth Connection Education Forum

On June 8th, 2004 a rare celestial event of

historical scientific importance will occur when

the silhouette of the planet Venus once again

crosses the face of the Sun as seen from the Earth.

This event, the transit of Venus, last occurred in

1882, so no one alive today has ever witnessed it.

In celebration of the event, the Office of Space

Science education and public outreach program

will offer activities and resources that are suitable

for use in classrooms and museums.

Leading up to the actual transit event,

everyone is invited to participate in Sun-Earth Day

2004-Venus Transit. The Web site http://

sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/sunearthday has been

developed to provide the resources and

opportunities for participation. Students and

teachers are invited to join NASA’s Sun-Earth

Connection Education Forum (SECEF) and

NASA’s Planet Quest Program [http://

planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/] to learn all about the

transit of Venus during a live broadcast from

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. This

interactive discussion will focus on what the

transit can teach us about the search for planets

beyond our solar system (over 100 have been

University of Houston–Downtown,

Dr. Penny Morris-Smith

University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez,

Mr. Rafael Fernandez

University of Texas at El Paso,

Dr. Ramon E. Lopez

MPI:

Medgar Evers College, Dr. Leon P. Johnson

TCU’s:

Salish Kootenai College, Dr. Timothy S. Olson

Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute,

Mr. Kirby Gchachu

Additional information about the projects

undertaken by these institutions may be found at

http://research.hq.nasa.gov/code_s/nra/

current/NRA-03-OSS-03/winners.html .

Perspectives Perspectives

The Space Science Minority University

Initiative – The First Three Years

Phil Sakimoto, NASA Headquarters

After three years of hard work, fifteen minority

universities engaged in groundbreaking efforts to

build space science capabilities on their campuses

in partnership with the NASA Office of Space

Science (OSS) have reported a remarkable set of

success stories.

Collectively, the institutions report being

engaged in research collaborations with 10 NASA

space science missions or suborbital projects and

in nearly 50 working partnerships with major

space science research groups. In academic

programs, they have established 25 new or

redirected space science faculty positions, 12 new

or revised space science degree programs that

nearly 100 students have selected, and 68 new or

revised space science courses with a total

enrollment to date of nearly 1,800 students. They

also engaged in a wide variety of teacher training,

precollege outreach, and public outreach programs.

These outcomes show that NASA’s Minority

University and College Education and Research

Partnership Initiative (MUCERPI) in Space Science

has been remarkably successful. Perhaps the most

significant key to this success is OSS’s active role

in providing guidance and in engaging the

community of OSS-sponsored researchers to serve

as active partners in collaborations with the

minority institutions involved in this program.

The results clearly demonstrate that vibrant

academic and research programs in astronomy

and space science can be built at minority

institutions provided that sponsoring Agencies

offer serious opportunities to do so.

For a full list of these institutions and articles

on many of their projects see http://

spacescience.nasa.gov/education/news/

index.htm or the OSS E/PO Annual Report at

http://ossim.hq.nasa.gov/ossepo/ .
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discovered so far). Taped video segments and

interviews will also cover how to watch the transit

safely, the impact of past transits in history, and

why Venus would be a deadly place to live. The

event can be viewed as a Webcast for schools with

high-speed Internet access, or a broadcast for those

with satellite receivers on March 19th.

For the actual transit event, join SECEF and

San Francisco’s Exploratorium for a live Webcast

on June 8, 2004. They will travel to Granada, Spain

to visit the Sierra Nevada Observatory for a clear

and unobstructed view of this amazing and rare

event. Museums and community groups around

the United States and the world will tune in as

they explore the role of past transits in the history

of astronomy and how the Venus transit was used

to calculate the distance from the Earth to the Sun,

called the Astronomical Unit (A.U.). The program

will present cutting edge research on Sun-Venus

and Sun-Earth interactions, and how NASA plans

to use similar transits to detect extrasolar planets.

During the time of the transit, professional and

amateur astronomers all over the world will be

waiting with sophisticated ground based

telescopes as well as spacecraft that will view the

transit in a myriad of wavelengths. A partnership

with Telescopes In Education (TIE) and Virtual

Telescopes In Education (VTIE) will provide images

of the event. The transit will be viewed by a suite

of solar observatories from Nova Scotia down to

Uruguay. Images of the transit from these sites

will be made available in near real time on the

Venus Transit Web site so that students may make

their own calculations of the A.U. and the size of

our solar system. Data will be stored on the VTIE

archives system allowing students to propose

observing experiments, make observations,

analyze their results, and publish their findings

online.

For American history buffs, school bands, and

museum kiosks, John Philip Sousa’s Transit of

Venus March, written in 1883, has been reperformed by the Virginia Grand Military Band.

The audio music file and band scoring will be

available at the Sun-Earth Day 2004 Web site. The

Smithsonian Institution will be also featuring an

exhibition of rare books related to the transit called

“Chasing Venus” at the Museum of American

History in Washington D.C. from March 2004 to

April 2005.

Cosmic Questions

Mary Dussault, Structure and Evolution of the

Universe Forum

On October 2, 2003 the National Geographic

Society held an opening-night event celebrating

the arrival of the exhibition Cosmic Questions: Our

Place in Space and Time [see Voyages 7, January

2003] at the Society’s Explorers Hall in

Washington D.C. Attending the event were

scientists, science educators, congressional

staffers, and officials from many national

organizations that fund and promote science

research and education. The program included

remarks by Terry Garcia, Executive Vice

President of the National Geographic Society;

Lawrence Small, the Secretary of the Smithsonian

Institution; Barry Van Deman of the National

Science Foundation, David Bohlin from NASA’s

Office of Space Science, and NASA astronaut

Donald Pettit. Professor Edward “Rocky” Kolb,

cosmologist at Fermilab and professor of

astrophysics at the University of Chicago, gave

the featured presentation about current and

future research in cosmology, which prompted

a lively question and answer period from the

audience.

The Cosmic Questions exhibition was

developed by the Harvard-Smithsonian Center

for Astrophysics (CfA), and sponsored by the

NSF and by NASA through the Structure and

Evolution of the Universe Education Forum at

the CfA.

Guests at the Cosmic Questions exhibit opening at

National Geographic Society's Explorers Hall use a nearinfrared camera to see what their eyes cannot. The

exhibition contains many examples of multi-wavelength

observing. Photo Credit, Mark Thiessen. Copyright

National Geographic Society.
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Farewell Galileo

Shannon McConnell, NASA Jet Propulsion Lab

They gathered at museums and coffee houses,

NASA centers and schools. Some cheered. Some

bid a fond adieu to an old friend. Others choked

back tears as the clock counted down to zero. The

Galileo spacecraft had spent 8-years immersed in

the intense radiation of Jupiter studying the planet,

its rings, moons, and vast magnetic field and was

now beaming its last bits of information back to

Earth while people across the country shared

memories of the mission’s successes and

challenges.

Space Place Web Site Combines Kids,

Cartoons, and the Cosmos

Nancy Leon, NASA Jet Propulsion Lab

Cartoon characters Kate and Carlos invite

animated versions of real NASA scientists and

engineers to appear on “Space Place Live,” the

newest addition to the educational Web site, Space

Place. The premiere talk show guest is Dr. Kip

Thorne, a California Institute of Technology

astronomer working on the Laser Interferometer

Space Antenna mission. [The mission will observe

gravitational waves from binary stars both inside

and beyond our galaxy, including gravitational

waves generated in the vicinity of the very massive

black holes found in the centers of many galaxies.]

Space Place guests are animated,

approachable, and communicate positive

messages about science, technology, and math as

related to the space program through friendly,

hands-on activities.

A link to the new series can be found at http://

spaceplace.jpl.nasa.gov/index.shtml .

What are Astronomers Doing?

What are Astronomers Doing? (http://

mcdonaldobservatory.org/research) is a weekly

updated Web site detailing current research at

McDonald Observatory. Each week, visitors can

find descriptions of all observing projects on

Observatory telescopes. A “NASA Astronomer

Solar System Ambassador, Dr. Ron Hobbs presented

Galileo highlights at the 125th Street Grill in Seattle,

Washington.

In addition to the September events at NASA

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where hundreds of past

project members gathered to share and watch the

final Doppler signal disappear, Solar System

Ambassadors invited the public to programs held

nationwide to participate in the excitement of and

the ending of a successful mission. Slide

presentations showing the mission’s greatest hits,

animation of the spacecraft’s final moments, and

live Doppler feed from mission control bounced

off screens in restaurants, schools, and every

imaginable location thanks to the enthusiasm of

Solar System Ambassadors. Many of the

Ambassadors felt especially connected to the

mission since the Ambassador Program was

originally founded as a nationwide network

supporting the Galileo Mission.

As Galileo himself gave us new visions into

our solar system and the Jovian planet, the Galileo

Mission has given us new visions for the future

and new understandings of our largest planet in

our solar system. Thanks for the ride Galileo —

you will be remembered fondly.

Kate and Carlo welcome Dr. Kip Thorne to

“Space Place-Live”.
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Future Venues for Space Science Exhibits

Cosmic Questions

[http://www.astc.org/exhibitions/cosmic/

dcosmic.htm]

February 1, 2004 - August 31, 2004

Ontario Science Centre

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Hubble Space Telescope - New Views of the

Universe

[http://www.sites.si.edu/exhibitions/]

April 3, 2004 - June 13, 2004

Kalamazoo Aviation History Museum

Kalamazoo, Michigan

October 16, 2004 - December 26, 2004

Challenger Space Science Center

Peoria, Arizona

January 22, 2005 - May 31, 2005

Minnetrista Cultural Center

Muncie, Indiana

MarsQuest

[http://www.astc.org/exhibitions/mars/imars.htm]

February 1 - April 30, 2004

The New Detroit Science Center

Detroit, Michigan

Office of Space Science Welcomes Anita

Krishnamurthi

Dr. Anita Krishnamurthi has joined the Office

of Space Science Education and Public Outreach

(E/PO) program on assignment from the

University of Maryland, College Park. She was

previously a Program Officer in the Office on

Public Understanding of Science (OPUS) of the

National Academy of Sciences in Washington, DC,

of the Week” feature was recently added through

an Office of Space Science ROSS E/PO supplement

award. Thus far, the site has featured astronomers

working on SIRTF, SIM, and Near-Earth Asteroids

projects. Each write-up is accompanied by a

biography of the astronomer or engineer in charge.

Site-related classroom activities aligned with

national science education standards are under

development. For more information, visit

http://whatareastronomersdoing.org .

where she managed various informal science

education programs targeted at adults. She has

also done technology outreach with the Boulder

Community Network in Boulder, Colorado.

In Anita’s earlier life as a stellar astronomer,

she worked on angular momentum evolution in

low mass stars using a combination of theoretical

modeling and observations of open clusters such

as the Pleiades. She received her Ph.D. from The

Ohio State University and went on to postdoctoral

research at the University of Colorado at Boulder,

working on X-ray emission from very low-mass

objects using the Chandra X-ray Observatory.

During her stint at NASA Headquarters, Dr.

Krishnamurthi will be working with several

projects including Project Prometheus, Living With

a Star, and Beyond Einstein to help develop their

E/PO programs.

OSS Sponsored NASA CONNECT Program

Wins Regional Emmy Award

Nahide Craig, Space Sciences Laboratory (SSL),

Berkeley

On June 21, 2003, the NASA CONNECT

program, “Data Analysis and Measurement:

Having a Solar Blast!” received a regional Emmy

award in the Children/Youth Program category.

In the program, students learn how NASA

researchers study the Sun and use satellite

technology to understand the Sun-Earth

connection. They also learn about three satellites

currently monitoring the Sun—SOHO, ACE, and

IMAGE and about RHESSI, a satellite that studies

high energy solar flares. By conducting hands-on

and Web activities, students make connections

between NASA research and the mathematics,

science, and technology they learn in their

classrooms.

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center scientists

Dr. Eric Christian, Dr. Sten Odenwald, and Dr.

Terry Kucera and Dr. Michelle Larson of the

University of California at Berkeley are featured

in the program. The Sun-Earth Connection Forum

funded the program, with Steele Hill, Brian

Dennis, Sten Odenwald and Elaine Lewis as the

consultants for the program.

More information is available at NASA

CONNECT : http://connect.larc.nasa.gov .

Awards
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New Educational Product New Educational Product

Staying Cool

Challenger Center for Space Science Education

The MESSENGER Education Modules [http:/

/btc.montana.edu/ceres/MESSENGER/

MEMS_SciProc.htm] are diverse packages of

educational materials developed for the

MESSENGER mission to Mercury. Staying Cool is

the first of several education units to be developed.

The focus of this

unit is to examine how

science can be used to

solve problems related

to staying cool in a hot

environment.

MESSENGER will

operate in and explore

the high temperature,

high-radiation

environment near

Mercury. It needs

some of the sunlight and radiation to meet the

scientific goals of the mission, but too much can

be quite disastrous to the instruments of the

spacecraft.

Staying Cool unfolds through a story

constructed around three questions:

• How can we study Mercury? [by using

light and particle radiation both reflected and

emitted from Mercury.]

• Are there any problems we might face?

[too much light and particle radiation can be

dangerous.]

• Are there ways to solve these problems?

[we can use a variety of means to stay cool.]

Each grade level component of the Staying Cool

unit consists of three lessons, each intended to

answer one of the above questions. At all grade

levels the story is the same, but the lessons chosen

explore phenomenology relevant to the specific

science standards associated with a grade level.

The content and concepts are far broader than

MESSENGER science and engineering, as they

should be if these educational materials are to be

relevant to the curriculum. The Messenger story

is used simply as one vehicle to address a broad

curriculum, which includes an understanding of,

e.g., light, heat, shadows, and energy transfer.

The Sun as Art 2003

Steele Hill, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

The new “Sun as Art” exhibit presents novel

ways of looking at the Sun, made possible by

advances in imaging technology and

sophisticated spacecraft engineering. Its goal is

to entertain while generating interest in the Sun,

a star that is usually taken for granted as a simple

ball of fiery gas that changes very little. The

exhibit’s 21 framed images show a very different

and dynamic picture. The images were assembled

by Steele Hill, SOHO (Solar and Heliospheric

Observatory) media specialist.

Students in particular seem to be inspired by

the show. A number of elementary and middle

school classes describe recent science/art projects

in which they draw their own Suns with quite

imaginative results after seeing some of these

images and others from SOHO.

After its run at the NASA Goddard Space

Flight Center Visitor’s Center, the exhibit will be

available in 2004 for loan to other venues. Thus

far, Exploration Place in Wichita, Kansas and Penn

Harris Madison Planetarium and Air/Space

Museum in Granger, Indiana have signed up to

exhibit the show and NASA Explorer Schools

[http://explorerschools.nasa.gov] plan to

circulate parts of the exhibit. The images are on

the Web in two resolutions and as a QuickTime

movie at http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/

pickoftheweek/old/SunAsArt/. Steele Hill can

be reached at steele.hill@gsfc.nasa.gov .

New Exhibit New Exhibit
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Educational Programs Educational Programs

MESSENGER Trains New Educator Fellows

Challenger Center for Space Science Education

In May 2004, NASA will launch the

MESSENGER (MErcury Surface Space

ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging)

spacecraft to study the planet Mercury.

MESSENGER [http://messenger.jhuapl.edu] will

be the first spacecraft to observe Mercury from

orbit. Its observations will allow us to see the

whole surface of the planet for the first time.

An important element of the MESSENGER

Education and Public Outreach effort is the

Educator Fellowship Program, managed by

Challenger Center. A group of Educator Fellows

who are master science teachers is being

developed to disseminate information and train

other teachers across the nation.

Nineteen Educator Fellows were selected in

April 2003 and eleven more will join the program

in the spring of 2004. The first MESSENGER

Fellowship Training Workshop was held at the

Challenger Center [http://www.challenger.org]

in Alexandria, Virginia, on June 23-27, 2003.

During the workshop, the Fellows were trained

on the MESSENGER Education Module unit,

Staying Cool, and Challenger Center’s Voyage

education materials. The Fellows were impressed

with the wealth and quality of the materials. Some

comments included, “This has been inspiring,

exciting, great!” and “I became excited about being

part of this project.”

Educator Fellows receive a kit including

presentation materials and planning tools to help

them get started. Each Fellow will train a

minimum of 120 teachers per year. Over the 11-

year program lifetime, more than 27,000 teachers

are expected to be trained, which can translate into

classroom activities for more than 1,000,000

students.

For more information about the MESSENGER

Educator Fellowship Program, visit http://

btc.montana.edu/ceres/MESSENGER/

epomain.htm or contact Lizzie Taylor,

etaylor@challenger.org.

Rutgers Astrophysics Institute

Kathy Lestition, Chandra X-ray Center, Smithsonian

Astrophysical Observatory

For the last seven years, teams of physics

teachers and students from New Jersey high

schools have forsaken other summer plans to

participate in a 4-week program at Rutgers

Astrophysics Institute (RAI) where they explore

the X-ray Universe through NASA satellites.

Created in a partnership between education and

science professionals by Professors Eugenia Etkina

(Rutgers Graduate School of Education) and Terry

Matilsky (Rutgers Department of Physics and

Astronomy), the program provides an intensive,

hands-on immersion experience to approximately

25 students and 12 teachers each year. RAI is cosponsored by Rutgers University Office of

Continuous Education and Outreach, the

Education Foundation of America, and NASA’s

Chandra X-Ray Center.

The main objectives of the program are to

involve high school students and their teachers in

authentic research in X-ray astrophysics using

innovative teaching methods and by doing so, to

improve the overall level of science teaching in

the participating schools. During the first two

weeks of the four-week program, basic physics

and astronomy concepts are introduced. The

emphasis is on inquiry-based learning, so that the

students and teachers begin to appreciate concepts

such as the differences between data collection and

analysis, and model building and model testing.

The next two weeks are spent learning to access

NASA archival databases through the Internet,

examining X-ray sources with data from Chandra,

EXOSAT and other satellites. The program

2003 MESSENGER Fellows. continues with a project that the student teams
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Chandra/GEAR UP Summer Program

Dr. Irene Porro, MIT Center for Space Research (CSR)

A group of extremely motivated high school

students from the Boston Public Schools

participated in the Chandra/GEAR UP Summer

Program in June-July 2003. The initiative, directed

by Dr. Irene Porro of the MIT Center for Space

Research (CSR), was the result of a collaboration

between CSR, Museum of Science, Boston (MoS)

and GEAR UP in Boston. MIT scientists met with

the students, introduced them to Chandra’s new

discoveries, and engaged in activities and museum

explorations to investigate the properties of the

electromagnetic spectrum and to learn about the

life cycle of stars.

The program benefited from collaborations

with various local institutions: scientists from the

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and

amateur astronomers from the Amateur Telescope

Makers of Boston contributed to a star gazing

party organized with the support of the Structure

and Evolution of the Universe (SEU) Education

Students Across The Country Take A

“Journey To The Beginning Of Time”

Mary Dussault, Structure and Evolution of the

Universe Forum

What was before the Big Bang? That’s the

question students from Boston asked Princeton

University’s WMAP scientist Dr. David Spergel

in a multi-point interactive videoconference on

October 15, 2003. Produced by the Adler

Planetarium and sponsored by the Structure and

Evolution of the Universe (SEU) Education Forum,

the “Journey to the Beginning of Time” distancelearning event involved hundreds of middle and

high-school students at several museum and

planetarium sites nationwide including the Adler;

Boston’s Museum of Science; the Ecotarium of

Worcester, Massachusetts; and the Chabot Space

and Science Center in Oakland, California.

Adler’s “Cyberspace” technology team used

the production as a pilot project to evaluate the

benefits and challenges of using interactive

explore on their own during the following year.

Six scheduled Saturday meetings at Rutgers bring

together University faculty, who work with the

student-teacher teams as they explore their

projects. Plans for future development include a

Web based distance learning course at Rutgers,

which will enable a wider audience to experience

the thrill of using NASA satellite data in a

meaningful way.

Further information about the Rutgers ASI

program can be found at http://xray.rutgers.edu/

asi . Connection to the Chandra Education Virtual

Observatory software can be found at http://

chandra-ed.cfa.harvard.edu .

Students use data to reconstruct the Hertzsprung Russell

Diagram during the RAI summer program.

videoconferencing to support conversations and

interactions between NASA scientists and many

students nationwide. The museums that

participated in the pilot program received a

package of pre-and post visit activities and

materials, as well as a loan of videoconferencing

equipment. Several scientists and E/PO

specialists from SEU missions assisted in the event

by visiting their local participating museums.

Lindsay Bartolone, Adler educator and WMAP

E/PO specialist was the host for the event. The

one-and-a-half-hour live program included a

presentation by Dr. Spergel on evidence for the

Big Bang; an interactive “Tour of the Universe”

game that asked students in each site to predict

the sequence of destinations in a tour out in space

and back in time; and a live question and answer

session with Dr. Spergel. While the pilot program

revealed several challenges to this technical

medium, one outcome was clear — students and

teachers enjoyed and wanted more of the direct

Question and Answer interaction with the

scientist.

What was Dr. Spergel’s answer to the Boston

student? That scientists just don’t know what was

before the Big Bang, but are working on ways to

explore what kind of physics might have powered

such an event.
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Students show the results of their first experience with the

Chandra Education Data Analysis Software.

Forum; and scientists and educators from the MIT

Haystack Observatory engaged the students in

radio observations with the Haystack Small Radio

Telescope.

For their final project the students worked on

science presentations that were featured at an

event hosted by the MoS and attended by family

members, museum staff, and Chandra scientists.

On that occasion Paula Clark, Project Director for

GEAR UP in Boston, expressed the appreciation

of her staff and students: “The support and

encouragement by the teachers and mentors from

MIT and the Boston Museum of Science was

extraordinary. I know that their interest and

encouragement has made an impact on the lives

and futures of all the students who participated

in the program.”

Imagine Mars

Stephenie Lievense, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Imagine Mars, co-sponsored by NASA and the

National Endowment for the Arts, is a Web based

project engaging elementary school students in

science and technology through the arts, letters,

and humanities.

One of the best examples of using Imagine Mars

comes from R.K. Mellon Elementary School,

Ligonier, Pennsylvania, where Art teacher Linda

O’Sullivan led her classes in a yearlong Imagine

Mars project. They kicked-off the 2002/03 school

year by constructing and “launching” a rocket to

Mars. Over the following months students wrote

songs, choreographed Mars dances, designed a

mission flag and created murals. Their extensive

project engaged students in each of the 5 Imagine

Mars project steps (reflect, imagine, discover,

create and share) and led students to a better

understanding of the elements of community, the

planet Mars, and the value of artistic expression.

With the 2003/04 school year well underway,

Imagine Mars is again engaging teachers and

students across the country. To bring this program

to the teachers with whom you interact, visit the

Web site at http://imaginemars.jpl.nasa.gov or

contact Stephenie Lievense at 818-393-6729.

Second grade students at R.K. Mellon Elementary School

complete their Imagine Mars project.

Wyoming Astronomy Camp

Dr. Kathleen Harper, University of Wyoming

This last summer the Wyoming Broker/

Facilitator from the Space Science Northwest

group [S2N2 http://www.s2n2.org] sponsored

the first annual Wyoming Astronomy Camp on

the campus of the University of Wyoming (UW)

in Laramie. In June and July thirty children from

the Boys and Girls Club in Casper, Wyoming

attended two, 3-daylong camps. NASA-funded

astronomy researchers Chip Kobulnicky, Danny

Dale, and Mike Pierce, and S2N2 representative

Kathleen Harper, as well as a number of UW

graduate and undergraduate students

coordinated camp activities. Students built

spectroscopes using a Sun-Earth Connection kit.

They observed the Sun in H-alpha wavelengths

and filtered visible light through the STAR

(Students Teaching and Research) telescope. In the

evening, the group viewed the stars in the very
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Support Network Brokers Partner with

Solar System Educators from Coast to Coast

The Brokers of Space Science Network

Northwest (S2N2) and the Mid-Atlantic Region

Space Science (MARSSB) collaborated with the Solar

System Educators Program [http://www.ssep.org]

to provide space science workshops in their regions.

S2N2 worked with the Space Grant Consortia

of Washington and Oregon to offer Astounding

Astronomy, to middle and high school teachers

Held July 21-25 at the University of Washington,

Astounding Astronomy featured content and

activities on planets, stars, galaxies, and the

Universe. The program addressed Washington

and Oregon science standards. Participants did

lesson plans based on NASA Office of Space

Wyoming Astronomy Camp students making true-color

images of the spiral galaxy M51.

dark night skies of Wyoming at the Red Buttes

Observatory, 12 miles south of town and captured

CCD images of distant celestial objects including

galaxies and planetary nebulae. The next day, the

students participated in physics experiments, built

and launched model rockets, and took a virtual

tour of the solar system. The students also had a

tour of the UW’s 2.3 meter infrared telescope

facility.

With only one university in this very rural

state, first hand exposure to science research and

the university environment can make a strong

impression on high school students. One student

was overheard telling another “I learned so much

today.” “That makes it all worthwhile,” says

Kobulnicky. Plans are underway to expand the

program next summer with support for an OSS

ROSS education and public outreach grant.

Science educational materials. Presenters included

NASA Jet Propulsion laboratory Solar System

Educator Debby Salter, NASA Aerospace

Education Services Program representative Brian

Hawkins, several University of Washington

faculty and graduate students, and Julie Lutz,

S2N2 director.

MARSSB established a partnership with the

Mid-Atlantic Region Space Grant Association,

Virginia Space Grant Consortium, and the Solar

System Educators Program to provide space

science workshops in Maryland, Kentucky, New

York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. Space

science researchers offered a glimpse into active

space science research and Solar System Educators

demonstrated inquiry-based activities that

support student interest in and understanding of

space science concepts.

“Teachers were hungry for this information,”

reported Ruth Ruud, a Solar System Educator

from Pennsylvania. Third-grade teachers from

Cairo Elementary in Cairo, New York, shared these

comments about the workshop: “I came away with

a number of great activities that I can use in my

class ... I plan to integrate all of the activities into

my program.”

At a workshop co-hosted by the West Virginia

Space Grant Consortium and the NASA Educator

Resource Center in Fairmont, West Virginia,

teachers learned ways to bring NASA scientists

and engineers into their classrooms through

videoconferencing.

Find out more from S2N2 at http://

www.s2n2.org and MARSSB at http://

marssb.cet.edu .

Astounding Astronomy 2003 Workshop participants build

their own simple cardboard tube telescopes.
11

The Sun-Earth Connection Education Forum

Jim Thieman, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center

The Sun-Earth Connection Education Forum

(SECEF) is a partnership of NASA Goddard Space

Flight Center and the University of California

Berkeley with teams working at both locations.

SECEF has the responsibility of inspiring students

and the public using the latest discoveries in the

sciences in the Sun-Earth Connection (SEC) theme

area, in particular: how the Sun as our nearest star

works; how it varies; and how it affects the nearEarth environment as well as the other planets in

the solar system. The scientists will excitedly tell

you about their latest discoveries involving the

ionosphere, magnetosphere, aurora, bow shock,

solar wind, corona, flares, sunspots, solar storms,

etc. SECEF works together with many dedicated

SEC scientists and education professionals to

spread their excitement and the new knowledge

gained.

SECEF has developed a number of approaches

to promote SEC science based on specific needs

of the education community. For example, in the

formal classroom education area there were very

few products on SEC subjects in the K-4 grade

levels. Resources like the Auroras book, Our Very

Own Star, the Sun book, and materials from the

Eye on the Sky program were facilitated for filling

this gap. Another example is the Student

Observation Network (SON) which was created

specifically as an interactive hands-on science set

of activities to enable students to understand how

events on the Sun can affect our environment on

Earth. Students see the variability of the Sun

NASA OSS NASA OSS

Support Network Profiles Support Network Profiles

This is the fourth in a series of articles which

highlights contributions of the organizations of the

NASA OSS E/PO Support Network (ESN). The 12

groups which make up the Support Network are

involved in coordinating and integrating the OSS

E/PO program. They provide a point of entry for

individuals and organizations wishing to participate

in the OSS E/PO program. A brochure describing the

Support Network can be found at

http://spacescience.nasa.gov/education/resources/

ecosystem/brochure_low_res.pdf .

through their own observations and by

monitoring the observations made by others.

They also study the effects of the Sun’s variability

on the Earth’s magnetosphere through direct

observations of Earth’s magnetic field variability

and the generation of aurora.

In public outreach and informal education

SECEF has worked with science centers,

museums, planetariums, amateur astronomers,

girl scouts, and solar system ambassadors. These

types of partnerships are especially useful for the

annual “big event” which is used to promote SEC

science on a national level. Participating groups

are provided educational materials and training

to talk about SEC science in programs they

conduct in their localities. In 2001 and 2002 these

events were solar eclipses. Auroras were featured

in 2003. In 2004 the transit of Venus across the Sun

(see page 2 for more information) will be the

central topic. In 2005 the theme will be “Ancient

Observatories”. Big events are also promoted for

use in formal classroom settings. Teachers can sign

up at a SECEF Web site [http://

sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov] to receive a packet of

educational materials relevant to the event.

The picture from the Chaco Canyon “ancient

observatory” shows most of the present SECEF

team with the exception of Nate James, Lori

Persichitti, and Bryan Stephenson. Pictured are,

left to right, Jim Thieman, Karin Hauck, Sten

Odenwald, Carol Lunsford, Ruth Paglierani,

Carolyn Ng, Rich Vondrak, Lou Mayo, Elaine

Lewis, Don Robinson-Boonstra, Karen Meyer,

Darlene Park, Greg Schultz, Isabel Hawkins, Igor

Ruderman, and Troy Cline. The dedicated efforts

of this group working together with SEC missions,

scientists, educators, volunteers and many others

has made the excitement of NASA Sun-Earth

Connection discovery an inspiration to both the

explorers of tomorrow and the citizens of today.
12

On the Horizon On the Horizon

If you would like to receive an electronic copy

of future newsletters, contribute an article or just

have questions about getting involved with the

NASA OSS E/PO Program, contact Larry Cooper,

Editor, at Larry.P.Cooper@nasa.gov . Prior

issues of Voyages are online at http://

spacescience.nasa.gov/education/news .

Chicago 2004- A Workshop To Foster Broader

Participation In NASA Space Science

Missions And Research Programs

Phil Sakimoto, NASA Headquarters

A diverse cadre of scientists, assembled from a broad

range of institutions, is essential to the future success of

NASA space science missions and research programs. —Dr.

Edward J. Weiler, NASA Associate Administrator for Space

Science

Currently envisioned NASA space science

missions span the next several decades, during

which time substantial turnover in the scientific

workforce and changes in the Nation’s

demographics will occur. To prepare for this

future, OSS is sponsoring a workshop aimed at

bringing together NASA personnel, current OSSfunded scientists and educators, and a diverse

array of scientists and educators who are

interested in participating in future OSS missions

and research programs. The workshop will be

held at the Hilton Chicago on June 28-29, 2004.

A specific goal of the workshop is to seed

personal contacts among a much more diverse

community of investigators than has traditionally

been active in NASA space science missions.

Consequently, underrepresented minority

scientists and educators in relevant disciplines,

scientists and educators at minority institutions,

and all current and prospective investigators

interested in expanding the diversity of

investigators on their future science teams are

particularly encouraged to attend. In addition,

all participants are expected to gain insights and

contacts leading to a better understanding of how

the NASA space science program is organized,

planned, and conducted; how missions and

research programs are conceived; how mission

and research teams are formed; and how

successful proposals are constructed.

For further information, visit http://

analyzer.depaul.edu/Chicago2004.

Museums Selected for PBS/NOVA’S Origins

Series.

Thomas Levenson, Origins Series Executive Producer.

Outreach for the Origins project, centered

around a prime-time, four part PBS/NOVA series,

achieved a significant milestone in September 2003

with selection of ten science center partners. The

centers will create ten city-wide events in

coordination with the series premiere, to be

followed up with a minimum of one year of

museum and community activities. This outreach

effort has been funded by NASA’s Office of Space

Science and by the National Science Foundation’s

Informal Science Education program.

The television series tells the story of the

evolution of a living cosmos. Program one focuses

on cosmic origins from the Big Bang to the

emergence of potential habitat. Program two

looks at the earth’s pre-biological history and

Program three continues with the story of the

origin of life here and its evolution to complexity.

Program four focuses on the search for life beyond

earth. The series host is Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson,

director of the Rose Center at the American

Museum of Natural History. Broadcast is slated

for fall 2004.

The Pacific Science Center in Seattle is creating

the outreach effort for the series. Its materials

focus on one core theme — how do scientists learn

about things that are distant in space, time, or both

– and it explores that theme in modules that focus

on exploring light and the rock record.

The ten partner centers selected are:

Adventure Science Center - Nashville, Tennessee

American Museum of Natural History - New York,

New York

Chabot Space & Science Center - Oakland,

California

Explorit Science Center-Davis, California

Fernbank Science Center-Atlanta, Georgia

Franklin Institute-Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Hooks Discovery & Learning Center-Indianapolis,

Indiana

International Museum of Art & Science-McAllen,

Texas

Museum of Science and Industry-Tampa, Florida

St. Louis Science Center-St. Louis, Missouri