2011 November 9. Berkeley Lab-founded Program Brings Astronomy to Africa. By Julia Chao, Berkeley Lab News Center. Excerpt: Susan Murabana majored in economics, but science is her true calling, or more specifically, science education and outreach. She loves nothing more than inspiring young people to engage in science and discover new concepts. So when she came across the educational program Global Hands-On Universe (GHOU) several years ago, she immediately knew she wanted to get involved.
GHOU was started in the early 1990s by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory astronomer Carl Pennypacker, who has now brought it to thousands of teachers in more than a dozen countries around the world. Murabana leads the effort in Africa—already she has reached hundreds of schools in her native Kenya and is making progress in other African nations as well….
…But it’s not just about Africa learning from the West. “I want to collect traditional sky knowledge in East Africa from different communities, and have something from Africa that we can share with the rest of the world,” she said….
2011 October 4. HOU founder Carl Pennypacker is a colleague of Saul Perlmutter at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Perlmutter and two other scientists share the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics for their work studying the acceleration of the expansion of the universe using supernova data. Carl and HOU TRAs reflect on this honor and its relationship to the work of HOU teachers and students at Carl's page.
Read press releases about this award, and the science behind it, from:
UC Berkeley News Center: http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2011/10/04/saul-perlmutter-awarded-2011-nobel-prize-in-physics/
The NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/05/science/space/05nobel.html?_r=1&ref=science
The San Francisco Chronicle:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2011/10/05/MNU61LD6UC.DTL
2010 Apr 13. OCHS senior advances in engineering event. The Derrick. Excerpt: Inga Saathoff, a student at Oil City High School, has been selected to advance to the International Science and Engineering Fair in San Jose, Calif., next month.
Saathoff was one of only two students picked to go to the May 9-14 event in California following the Pittsburgh Regional Science and Engineering Fair last month.
More than 1,000 students from about 100 school in western Pennsylvania and Maryland competed for $1 million in cash prizes and scholarships at the Pittsburgh fair. About 1,500 students from 50 nations will compete for scholarships tuition grants, internships and scientific field trips at the international fair.
The grand prize will be an all-expense paid trip to the Nobel Prize ceremonies in Stockholm, Sweden.
Saathoff's research focuses on the development of a new method to identify young, sun-like T-Tauri stars in their earliest stages of development using small-scale optical telescopes.
Tim Spuck [HOU teacher leader], Saathoff's teacher at Oil City, said her work has brought the idea from a "maybe it will work" to "yes this method has strong scientific merit" and potentially will lead to an all-sky survey and long-term monitoring project for years to come.…
2010 Feb 25. Cape student makes mark on universe. By ROBERT GOLD. Excerpt: Kelsie Krafton, a senior at Sturgis Charter Public School in Hyannis, hopes to add her initials to the names of the two asteroids she has discovered...
...Two years ago, Kelsie Krafton took her first physics class. Now, she's discovering asteroids and soaring toward a career in astrophysics.
As a then-sophomore at Sturgis Charter Public School in Hyannis, Kelsie breezed through her first physics class. She was bored by how easy it seemed. But one day, she flipped on a television show about astrophysics and was hooked.
"It kind of added a whole new dimension to the subject," she said of viewing astrophysics as filled with adventure and exploration. Kelsie decided she wanted to pursue a career in the field.
This week, the 17-year-old Falmouth resident received official word that she's discovered two asteroids through a global space exploration project. The International Astronomical Search Collaboration, a network of research institutes and science laboratories, confirmed that the high school senior had found two new asteroids.
The program's founder, Dr. Patrick Miller of Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas, e-mailed Kelsie's Sturgis math teacher, Randy Carspecken, with the news.
Kelsie, who submitted her asteroid findings on Valentine's Day, found out about the accomplishment when she checked her laptop Tuesday night. She ran around her family home in celebration.
"This is something (she'll) never forget," Carspecken said of the discovery....
2010 Feb 9. ARO confirms WISE Space Telescope
Comet Discovery. Robert Holmes used
the first ground based telescope, the ARO 0.81-m to confirm
the first WISE space telescope comet discovery now known
as COMET P/2010 B2 (WISE). Many large observatories attempted
to confirm this discovery more than 7 days earlier including
the Faulkes 2.0m telescope in Hawaii as well as the 0.81m
telescope at ARO without success. However due to poor
weather, ARO had to wait 7 more days to make their second
attempt at the WISE discovery on 2010 02 07. Holmes and
Harlan Devore located the target in ARO images at nearly
the same time separated by about 800 miles. Two other
telescopes also confirmed the WISE comet discovery including
the 3.6-m telescope at Mauna Kea operated by A. Draginda
and D.J. Tholen and the Spacewatch 1.8-m telescope at
Kitt Peak operated by J.V. Scotti. For an animation of
this discovery confirmation and the MPEC, see http://killerasteroidproject.org/wise_obs_page.htm
2010 Jan 14. Pennypacker
Wins Janssen Prize for HOU.
Berkeley Lab astrophysicist Carl Pennypacker — founder
of Hands-On Universe (HOU), the award-winning international
science education program — was awarded the Janssen
Prize by the French Astronomical Society. Named after
astronomer Pierre Jules César Janssen, founder
of the Paris Meudon Observatory and co-discoverer of
helium, the Janssen Prize is the society's highest
award and is given every other year to a non-French
scientist. Pennypacker was recognized for his work
with HOU, a program that enables students to explore
the cosmos via the Internet, working with real scientists
and professional telescopes.
2009 Oct 30. From: Patrick
Miller. Greetings from the International Astronomical
Search Collaboration. The All-Texas Asteroid Search
Campaign and NEO Confirmation Campaign are currently
on hold. The weather has been overcast and raining
for the past five nights at the ARI Observatory. The
Full Moon occurs on Monday night so the likelihood
remains slim that image sets will be available in the
coming days. Should this change, you will be notified
immediately.
Unfortunately astronomy is at the mercy of the weather and the
Moon. For the past week it seems that both have conspired to
slow down IASC and your students from making important discoveries
and observations. But be patient...the situation should begin
to improve in the coming week.
The following are the asteroid discoveries made so far during
the current campaigns:
2009 TH2 - Dankov, Hsu, Chae, & Hennig
Thomas
Jefferson HS VA 10/11/09
2009 TD2 - K. Dankov
Bulgarian Academy of Science Bulgaria 10/11/09
2009 TH5 - Dankov, Pannill, & Schmidt
Meredith College NC 10/11/09
2009 TS10 - Dankov, Pannill, & Schmidt
Meredith College NC 10/11/09
2009 UX2 - Dankov, Kirby, & Diaz
Ranger High School TX 10/18/09
2009 UA6 -Foglia, Anderson, McAbee, Craig, & Kilgo
May High School TX 10/18/09
2009 UZ5 -Dankov & Sawberger
Tarrant County CC TX 10/18/09
2009 UC18 - K. Dankov
Bulgarian Academy of Science Bulgaria 10/18/09
2009 UN14 - Dankov, Kirby, & Diaz
Ranger High School TX 10/18/09
2009 UM20 - K. Dankov
Bulgarian Academy of Science Bulgaria 10/25/09
Don't forget, too, that R. Watanabe from Shizuoka University
(Japan) made an NEO confirmation of 2009 TA1 on October 11th
and H. Chun from Cranston High School East (RI) made a virtual
impactor observation of 2009 TE10 on October 18th.
2009 Oct 20. From: Patrick
Miller. Greetings from the International Astronomical
Search Collaboration
Congratulations go to D. Hsu, K. Chae, & L. Hennig from Thomas
Jefferson High School (VA) for the assisted discovery of 2009
TH2. Also congratulations go to C. Pannill & B. Schmidt from
Meredith College (NC) for the assisted discovery of 2009 TH5.
Both of these objects are new Main Belt asteroids.
IASC has joined with the Sierra Stars Observatory Network to
do follow-ups on original asteroid discoveries. The Minor Planet
Center (Harvard) requires follow-ups within 7 days in order to
receive credit for these discoveries. You can see how successful
this has been since there have been three discoveries within
the image sets from October 11th. During the previous campaign
with 19 days of image sets, there were no discoveries!!
2009 Oct 13. From: Patrick
Miller. IASC congratulations are in order for observations
and discoveries:
--R. Watanage from Shizuoka University
(Japan) made the confirmation of the near-Earth object
(NEO) 2009 TA1. Along with K. Dankov from the Bulgarian
Academy of Science, this student made an important observation
confirming the orbit of this NEO.
--K. Dankov discovered two new Main Belt asteroids, 2009 TH2
and 2009 TD2.
--Students from Belmont HS, Cordova HS, Folsom Lake College Meredith
College, ZSO Toruniu, Colleyville Heritage HS, and Tarrant County
CC made NEO observations that were reported as part of the NASA
Near-Earth Object Program (Jet Propulsion Laboratory).
2009 October. Web video on the Universe Quest
after-school/summer program:
2009 June 26. Students,
Faculty Recognized by NASA. Students
at Folsom Lake College recently received NASA research
awards for measuring Potentially Hazardous Asteroids
for NASA and the Killer Asteroid Project. FLC Astronomy
instructor Glenn Reagan led his class of students that
included Cindy Terpe and Steve Kemppainen. Many teachers
and students like Reagan, Terpe, and Kemppainen also
had their names published at Harvard University for
observations with exceptional scientific value to the
astronomical community. Cindy Terpe won the award this
year for the most student asteroid discoveries in the
world with 4 discoveries.
Each of the students received NASA – Astronomical
Research Institute award certificates this month for
their research efforts over the school year. Folsom
Lake College also received an engraved NASA award plaque
that includes the lead instructor Glenn Reagan and
each of the student names who participated in NASA’s
Near Earth Object Observations Program and the Killer
Asteroid Project.
"The students at Folsom Lake College downloaded our images
from the Internet that were taken by powerful telescopes at
our observatory that can see stars 10 million times fainter
than you can see with your own eye", stated Robert Holmes,
a research scientist for NASA’s Near Earth Object Observations
Program. "Students in the Killer Asteroid Project made
high quality measurements of these important objects that pose
a possibility of striking the earth sometime in the future.
Our goal in the Killer Asteroid Project is to measure these
objects for NASA’s Near Earth Object Observations program
and help protect the earth from a possible future asteroid
or comet impact."...
June 2009. Video
news report (from our local San Francisco Bay
Area ABC station) on the HOU Universe Quest astronomy
game development.
2009 May 15. Online
games spark girls' interests in science & technology.
By Robert Sanders, UC Berkeley Media Relations. Excerpt:
BERKELEY — Ruby Knight and Tiffany Farmer, sixth
and seventh grade Girl Scouts at the ASA Academy in
West Oakland, ... Susan Murabona, an educator and astronomer
in Nairobi, Kenya... Lech Mankiewicz, an astrophysicist
in Warsaw, Poland ...all got together via the Internet
earlier this month to begin assembling an online game
that will help girls around the world explore the cosmos
and perhaps steer them toward careers in software development
and information technology. "The Universe Quest
Game," an immersive game similar to the popular
multi-user virtual world called "Second Life," is
being made possible by a $1.5 million grant from the
National Science Foundation (NSF) to the University
of California, Berkeley. ...From his home in Warsaw,
Mankiewicz coached Murabana, taking her step by step
through the intricacies of using the telescope and
acquiring images. Murabona then taught the girls to
use a free French software program known as SalsaJ
to combine three images, taken with red, green, and
blue filters, to make a true color image of the galaxy.
... the girls are making great games, they're engaged, they are
enthusiastic, they are learning things. ..."I think it is
fantastic that girls our age get to make a game," said seventh
grader Tiffany. ...So far, a dozen girls meet to work on the
game two afternoons a week for two hours at the ASA Academy & Community
Science Center, a small, urban, hands-on school that helps traditionally
underrepresented youth prepare to move into the ever-changing
scientific and technological world. The 3-D online environment
the girls are now constructing will eventually be open to girls
around the world to explore and build upon. See full
article.
2009 May. From Dr. Roger
Ferlet of EU-HOU, France HOU, and GHOU:
In the framework of the Czech Presidency of the European Union,
a conference, Innovation and Creativity in the Lifelong Learning
Programme: Create, Innovate and Cooperate, was held on 6
and 7 May 2009 in Prague. Part of the conference was dedicated
to awarding outstanding European projects and best innovative
practices which will serve as good motivating examples to wider
public, in order to accomplish the goals set by European leaders
in Lisbon to become "the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based
economy in the world" by 2010 in the field of Education
and Training. In the category "Information and Communication
Technologies", our project, Hands-On Universe, Europe – Bringing
frontline interactive astronomy to the classroom, has been
awarded the silver medal by the European Commission. It was given
to me by the Czech Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, Ondrej
Liška and the European Commissioner for Education, Training,
Culture and Youth, Ján Figel.
2009 Mar 11. The latest
round of virtual impactor observations (VIOs) and observations
of near-Earth objects (NEOs) are now fully listed at
the IASC web site. Go to http://iasc.hsutx.edu/index_files/Page786.htm for
the complete list. To date there have been 4 Main Belt
asteroid discoveries, 1 NEO discovery, 7 VIOs, 4 NEO
confirmations, and 148 NEO observations. The NEO observations
are reported to the Minor Planet Center (Harvard) and
the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Pasadena, CA) as part
of the NASA Near-Earth Object Program. This is truly
an impressive list of discoveries and observations!!
Dr. Patrick Miller
2009 Feb 2 Patrick Miller
of the International Astronomical Search Collaboration
(IASC) reports that Steven Kirby, a high school science
teacher at Ranger High School (Ranger, TX), discovered
a near-Earth object during the Texas Region 14 Big
Country Math & Science Symposium. To be more precise,
it was co-discovered by the ARI Observatory director
Bob Holmes, Steven Kirby, and Kolyo Dankov (a graduate
student at the Bulgarian Academy of Science and a participant
of the IASC NEO Confirmation Campaign). This is the
first time anyone in IASC has discovered an asteroid
crossing or near Earth's orbit. Two other observatories
have confirmed the sighting and the orbit for this
object is being built by the Minor Planet Center at
Harvard - http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/mpec/K09/K09C09.html.
It is not unusual to discover a Main Belt asteroid
because they number in the hundreds of thousands. The
NEOs number in the thousands, and are a much rarer
find. Bob Holmes of the Astronomical Research Institute
(ARI) observatory adds: "This is not just and
NEO. You might be interested to know that the discovery
is a 'Virtual Impactor.' ...It was placed on the NASA/JPL
risk page...." This discovery has received national
attention on both the Sky & Telescope and Universe
Today web sites. For more information, you can check
out the story on the Universe
Today site. This asteroid is 0.3 km in size and
in 2042 will pass within 32,000 km of Earth (5.5 Earth
radii), and even closer in 2046. Keep in mind that
32,000 km is actually closer to Earth than the geosynchronous
satellites. At 0.3 km in size, it is as large as 3
football fields, and has a mass of 3.5 x 1010 kg. If
it were to hit the Earth it would release the energy
equivalent to 1000 MT of TNT (i.e., 1000 simultaneous
hydrogen bomb explosions). So...you never know what
your students may discover as they analyze the many
image sets available in their school folders.
Nov 2008 The number of
new asteroid discoveries remains at 23 but the list
of NEO observations is long and includes many of IASC
students. The current campaign continues until December
5, 2008, and we expect still more original discoveries
and important contributions to the measurements of
the impact threatening near-Earth objects.
2008 Jul 2 HOU/Spitzer Student
Project: Alekzandir Morton and Thomas Travagli presented
their research on determining the redshift of S5 0716+714
at the California State Science Fair and were awarded
first place in the Senior Division of Physics and Astronomy.
They were mentored by SSC scientist Mark Lacy. The
students were awarded a $1000 scholarship each. Articles
about them were published by the Contra
Costa Times and in the Antioch
Press. John Michael Santiago, who assisted with
the data reduction on the WZ Sge project, received
a 4th place award at the Contra Costa Science and Engineering
Fair. ---Jeff Adkins [HOU teacher]
2008 April 18 Patrick
Miller reports that so far in the International
Asteroid Search Campaign (IASC), concluding Friday,
May 2, 2008, students found 6 new asteroids, 6 VIO
(virtual impactor observations), 4 published NEO observations,
and 26 unpublished NEO confirmations. Congratulations
to VIII LO, Katowice (Poland), the UAI Minor Planets
(Italy) and students from China Hands-On Universe for
the discovery of two new Main Belt asteroids!!
Asteroid K08GB1Z
S. Foglia; UAI Minor Planets (Italy)
B. Lanuszny, Z. Adamus, K.Gibinski, & A.Mucha; VIII
LO, Katowice (Poland)
Asteroid K08GB1Y
S. Foglia; UAI Minor Planets (Italy)
M. Zhou; China Hands-On Universe
2008
Jun 13 Update From: Patrick Miller: We
have a list
of schools participating in the 2007-2008 asteroid
campaigns (plus one pilot supernova campaign).
We've changed the name of IASC from International
Asteroid Search Campaign to International Astronomical
Search Collaborative (still calling it "Isaac").
The plan is to completely develop the supernova
search campaign and including search campaigns
for Kuiper Belt objects and comets.
Since October 2006 at the start of IASC, 97 schools
have participated from 9 countries. The countries include
China, Germany, Italy, Japan, Morocco, Poland, Portugal,
Russia, and United States.
Students from these schools have discovered 82
asteroids, made 2 comet confirmations, 6 virtual impactor
observations, and hundreds of near-Earth object confirmations.
As far as the most number of discoveries, I don't have
this recorded but I believe the schools from Poland hold
this title. Some schools have discovered as many as 4
asteroids, as I recall.
Dec 2007
International
Asteroid Search Campaign
Teachers and students have successfully
completed the Fall 2007 IASC search campaigns.
There were a total of 38 new Main Belt asteroids
discovered, with 2 more waiting to be announced....2007
VSK1 and 2007 WG00. There were 24 schools participating
from 7 countries (Germany, Italy, Japan, Morocco,
Poland, Portugal, and United States)...15 were
high schools and 9 were colleges. The Spring 2008
campaigns start on February 1, 2008, will include
a total 9 countries including China and Russia.
See more
details on the Asteroid Discoverers.
16 July 2007. Gruber Cosmology Prize.
HOU Co-director and founder Carl
Pennypacker has shared a prize with members of
the team he helped found that led to the discovery
of evidence for Dark Energy. Please see:
- LBNL
article that refers to Carl as the Supernova
Cosmology Project (SCP) co-founder.
- 2007
Gruber Cosmology Prize Press Release with
a list of the SCP tea
May 10-11, 2007. Hands-On-Universe
Holds Teachers’ Workshop in Kenya. Excerpt:
For high school students in the Republic of Kenya
in Eastern Africa, star-gazing was enhanced by Hands-On-Universe
(HOU), .... On May 10th and 11th, HOU held an
Internet teleconference workshop for nearly a dozen
teachers at Kenya High School, a national residency
school for girls. This is the first HOU workshop to
be held on the continent of Africa.
“There are certain
images and concepts that transcend backgrounds and
capture everyone's imaginations. Turning a telescope
to the sky opens that view to everyone and spurs them
to learn more. The HOU program provides an excellent
opportunity to continue and spread this activity and
interest,” said George Smoot, an astrophysicist
at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory... who shared
the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics. Full
article at Berkeley Center for Cosmological Physics
and workshop
movie (330 MB)
March 2007. You are welcome to visit the EU-HOU
web site and download the Windows Media movie
of the Lunar - Saturn occultation of March 2, 2007.
See also Saturn occultation of 22 May 2007 at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3nk6wvnrCA
--Lech Mankiewicz
Spring 2006. HOU teacher Jeff Adkins and students
in the Antioch ESPACE Academy at Deer Valley High School
(DVHS) have observed Active Galactic Nuclei on the Spitzer
Infrared Space Telescope as well as with ground based
scopes. Project results are online at http://www.espaceacademy.com (click
on the Spitzer Space Telescope picture).
DVHA students also did well at their county science fair. See
details on the HOU
Teacher News page and the ESPACE
press release page. Many thanks to all of the programs from
NOAO, the Spitzer Science Center, HOU, and elsewhere that allowed
our students to succeed.
 HOU was featured in a report on
the Internet Scout project of National
Science Digital Library (NSDL).
From Janesville Gazette article: "Observatory
moves to new mission of drawing students into
astronomy"
by Chris Schultz, July 3, 2006
"Daniel Pryke and brothers Orion and Rowan
Danou, 5 and 3, watched with awe as Yerkes Observatory's 40-inch
refracting telescope swung into operation.
"Yerkes is now a key part of Hands-On Universe . . .
' This is not education in which people
come in and lecture in a classroom,' [Yerkes Science Director
Kyle Cudworth] said. 'We're helping students work with real data.' "
From Janesville Gazette article about HOU/Yerkes
Observatory: "Yerkes'
star still shines", by Chris Schultz, July 3,
2006.
"In March, Yerkes confirmed the discovery
of a supernova in a distant galaxy that's part of the Ursa
Major constellation, also know as the Big Dipper...Now named
Supernova 2006bg, the image was taken by Robert Holmes . .
. Holmes sends his images to Yerkes for use in the Hands-On
Universe program, an education program that gets raw astronomical
data into the hands of high school science students.
[Yerkes staff member Vivian Hoette] and others at Yerkes
are working on blending research with hands-on-and eyes-on-education,
so each new discovery may also create a new insight for students
and teachers."
30 Jan 2005. New
Focus for Yerkes
Excerpt: One outreach worker,
Vivian Hoette, is involved with a group called Hands-On Universe.
On a chilly moonlit night last year, Hoette hosted science
teachers John Bruss from Deerfield High School in Illinois and Frank Mills
from Palombi Middle School in Lake Villa, Ill. They
were using a smaller, 24-inch reflecting telescope
at Yerkes to take pictures of galaxies and nebula and
learn more about the science of astronomy.
During the evening, Hoette's cell phone rang.
Hughes Pack, a science teacher from Mount Herman boarding school
in Northfield, Mass., asked her to photograph an asteroid while
he conducted an evening astronomy class a thousand miles away.
In less than half an hour, Hoette shot a multiple-picture
sequence of the dim but fast-moving asteroid and uploaded the
images to the Hands-On Universe Web site.
Pack said his students love this type of lesson. "This
is real time. Look what happens in 20 minutes. The
students really like to see things change and move."
March 2005. Small Telescope
Parallax Group, which includes several HOU teacher
leaders, looks for asteroids that come relatively close
to Earth, whose parallax (and hence distance) can be
determined by equipment available to amateur astronomers. See results
for asteroid 1998WT.
HOU collaborators in the Small Telescope Parallax Group:
Vivian Hoette, Hands-On Universe; Kaoru Kimura, Riken Institute of Japan; Mike
Ford, Elk Creek Observatory; Lech Mankiewicz,
Center for Theoretical Physics of Poland.
2004-2005. Congratulations to HOU teacher,
Fred Page, for being named Secondary Teacher of the Year for Detroit
Public Schools!
October 8, 2004. Science Magazine, Vol. 306, Issue 5694, 216-217.
Robotic
Telescopes Give Kids a Cosmic Classroom. HOU
receives some nice publicity in this article on robotic
telescopes. Yerkes
Observatory is mentioned, along with our rapidly evolving network of
telescopes. The article's main focus is on the Faulkes Telescopes,
a set of two telescopes, one in Hawaii and one in Australia. HOU
teachers and collaborators have used the Faulkes on
a limited basis already and hope to expand, somewhat,
usage of these good instruments over the next few years.
March 11, 2004. Education Extra: Science classes looking up.
By Walter Yost -- Sacramento Bee Bee Staff Writer.
At the start of every astronomy class, [HOU TRA] Glenn
Reagan's students scramble to computers to gaze at
the latest breathtaking images from Mars: solar eclipses
of the planet's two moons, the 100-mile-wide Gusev
Crater, a dusty blue Martian sunset. "I've been teaching for 17 years,
and nothing has been as interesting to students," said the Cordova
High School instructor. ..."The photographs we're getting now are
just beyond description," he said. Reagan expects Mars mania will
carry over to upcoming space events, including June 4, when Venus crosses
the sun, and July 1, when the Cassini spacecraft enters Saturn's orbit.
"I think it's great that our generation will be the first to explore
Mars," said Natasha Cabrera, a senior in Reagan's class. "If
we find evidence of life on Mars, maybe we could find something about
where we came from." ...Students like those in Reagan's class are
also benefiting from impressive new technology, such as computerized
astronomy. They're able to use image-processing software developed by
"Hands-On Universe" at the Lawrence Hall
of Science at UC Berkeley to request, receive and process
their own astronomical images for projects like asteroid
searches. In addition, they are communicating with
other student astronomers via the Internet. Currently,
Reagan's class is collaborating with peers at a North
Carolina campus on a project measuring the mass of
Saturn....
June 23-27, 2003 HOU
Annual Conference 2003 was at Yerkes Observatory and Aurora College.
June 13-20, 2003. Wisconsin DPI Education Forum, Volume 6, Number 37.
Students from WCBVI travel to Yerkes Observatory. Visit gives
students and staff experience with equipment for SEE Project. Students and staff
members from the Wisconsin Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired (WCBVI)
joined members of the Williams Bay Lions Club for the presentation of a special
graphics printer and tour of the Yerkes Observatory in Williams Bay June 12.
Summary article archived at http://www.dpi.state.wi.us/seachange/archive/0122.html
June 13, 2003. Janesville Gazette. Blind students use other
senses to explore space. By Chris Schultz/Gazette Staff. WILLIAMS BAY-
None of the students had been in an observatory before. It's a fair bet most
have never seen starlight, either. Seven students from the Wisconsin Center
for the Blind and Visually Impaired in Janesville visited the University of
Chicago Yerkes Observatory on Thursday for a presentation, a tour and pizza-but
also to experience a universe that most of us know nothing about.
May, 1999—HOU Receives $2.5 Million NSF Grant—The
grant from the National Science Foundation, awarded to UC Berkeley's Lawrence
Hall of Science - a national leader in creating science and math curricula for
schools - will allow the HOU program to expand from 60,000 students today to
an estimated 300,000 in five years. See UC
Berkeley press release
1998—HOU teacher wins McAuliff award.
1998—HOU students discover a Kuiper
Belt asteroid.
1997—HOU in a White
House Press Release (1997)
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