SCIENCE INQUIRY VOCABULARY I'll shortly post info about the Science Inquiry Vocabulary project that we began at the OSTA Conference in Coos Bay in October, we had several people attend and we began our list of words.
JAMES WEB SCOPE MAY BE CANCELED! The US House of Representatives Appropriations Committee has just approved a budget for several agencies including NASA that effectively CANCELS the JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE (JWST) project! JWST is the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope (launches by direct rocket, not the Shuttle). There have been cost overruns and delays cited, but canceling this critically important science mission will cause a lot of job losses aside from taking away the US lead in astrophysics and seriously setting back research in all major aspects of the field. Please let your Congressional Representatives (and Senators, and President Obama) know that JWST is critical to our science, education, and employment progress! (See info from American Astronomical Society (AAS) about who to contact and what to say.)
OUTREACH IN JEOPARDY Teachers, I've enjoyed working with you and your students during last schoolyear. I hope we can find support so that the visits can continue in the 2011-2012 year. I'll be working on finding funding, and if you can try to set aside some dollars beforehand, or contact a local business or foundation, maybe we can continue with the classroom visits. I'm willing to continue to volunteer my time, but I need costs reimbursed.
If you are a potential donor/underwriter, I'd be glad to discuss the program with you and to arrange a suitable method to receive/manage/disburse your contribution. To maximize effectiveness and minimize taxes, what we really need is a way to reimburse auto rental, fuel, motel, and restaurant charges.
Don't hesitate to contact me if you'd like an outreach visit or just have a question about space/the sky. rkang@efn.org
I'll be looking into a project involving after-school presentations, that apparently has some recent Federal backing. Perhaps we can leverage visits to classes during school hours via this route.
---------------------------------------------------------------------- Original info posted at this sublink, updated April, 2011: 2009 was the INTERNATIONAL YEAR of ASTRONOMY (IYA), celebrated 400 years since Galileo first turned a telescope on the sky. There will be some residual activities going on in 2011 and even beyond. The star, Epsilon Aurigae is under close observation by many amateur and professional astrophysicists. This star is predicted to change brightness as the disk of dust and gas that we think surrounds this star interacts with the star. One event has already been observed. See the Campaign 2009 site for details.
You can order a GalileoScope, a slightly improved version of the refractor Galileo used, this device has been designed by educators for students and public to introduce as many people as possible to actual telescopic views of Moon and Planets (DON'T EVER VIEW THE SUN !!!) See http://www.galileoscope.org/ for details. Very reasonably priced, easy to assemble, can be dis-assembled for classroom instruction in optics.
See more info, featured topics and objects to study and observe each month, and projects and resources for students at: NASA IYA Website, and at the Astronomical Society of Pacific IYA website, contacts
listed there. The Boston Globe posted a series of spectacular Solar closeup images at their http://bigpicture website. FYI, the site does include quite a few comments by readers, including a debate about religion, you may want to preview this if your group is sensitive about the topic. -------------------------------------------------------------------- TUTORIALS ABOUT SOLAR SYSTEM and LIGHT POLLUTION plus way cool LIGHT POLLUTION SIMULATOR from International Darksky Association --------------------------------------------------------------------- WORKSHOPS - PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT for all seasons:
In Oregon, check local sources
like ESDs for workshops. I'll post info about astronomy workshops on the website here.
We are trying to develop demand info for a Professional Development workshop about astrophysics/astronomy within the Science Inquiry framework, along the lines of our prior Summer events, if you're interested in any type of workshop about aspects of astronomy and astrophysics, please contact Rick (rkang@efn.org) so we can get a tally so that Professor Bothun can get some leverage for funding. Thanks! --------------------------------------------------------------------- Our hemispheric projects have terminated due to lack of interest.
I did propose a project on the National Lab Day website about finding asteroids using images taken from the Sierra Stars Observatories Network (SSON), but NLD buried the information in the site, and there haven't been any takers so far. If you're interested, let me know, I still have several minutes of telescope time prepaid with SSON that I'd be willing to donate to a student interested in trying a project.
