I am old enough to remember that scientists, engineers, and mathematicians made an enormous contribution to science and math education for the twenty years following Sputnik. I was privileged to be a student of two of the giants in science education of the time, Jerrold Zacharias of MIT and Fletcher Watson from Harvard. I feel that we owe much of our nation s current dominance in science and technology to this past partnership between federal support, scientists, and teachers. There are lessons to be learned from this history. Our center s scientists have a tradition of responding to calls to give public talks and visit classrooms as a form of public service.
Many research centers give tours and run speaker s bureaus.
The reason that we have enjoyed a substantive impact on American science education is in large part a result of the commitment of many of our scientists. We provide structured opportunities to our scientists to contribute their expertise without being put in situations where their set of skills may be weak. For example, few of our scientists have experience teaching children, so we do not have them replace classroom teachers. Scientists and engineers helped design a network of automated telescopes for children, now stretching from Cambridge to Australia, which allow students to take pictures of astronomical objects over the World-Wide Web. Working with teachers they developed a series of investigations that helps students build their astronomical knowledge and process skills.