HR: 0830h
AN: ED51C-1222    [PDF]
TI: Exploring Earth's Ionosphere with CINDI: Bringing an Upper Atmosphere Mission into Pre-College Classrooms
AU: * Urquhart, M L
EM: urquhart@utdallas.edu
AF: William B. Hanson Center for Space Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas, Mail Station FO22 P.O. Box 730688, Richardson, TX 75083-0688
AU: * Urquhart, M L
EM: urquhart@utdallas.edu
AF: Department of Science/Mathematics Education, University of Texas at Dallas, Mail Station FO22 P.O. Box 730688, Richardson, TX 75083-0688
AU: Hairston, M R
EM: hairston@utdallas.edu
AF: William B. Hanson Center for Space Sciences, University of Texas at Dallas, Mail Station FO22 P.O. Box 730688, Richardson, TX 75083-0688
AU: Richardson, J M
EM: martial@utdallas.edu
AF: Department of Physics, University of Texas at Dallas, Mail Station FO32 P.O. Box 730688, Richardson, TX 75083-0688
AU: Olson, C
EM: colson@mckinneyisd.net
AF: McKinney Independent School District, Scott Johnson Middle School 3400 Community Drive, McKinney, TX 75071
AB: We will present the Education and Public Outreach work in progress for the joint Air Force/NASA project CINDI (Coupled Ion Neutral Dynamic Investigation), which will launch in early 2004 on a US Air Force C/NOFS (Communications/Navigations Outage Forecast System) Satellite. CINDI, in conjunction with the other instruments on C/NOFS, will study how radio signals sent through the ionosphere are affected by variability with this layer of the atmosphere. The Educational outreach for CINDI is focused on helping students, educators, and the general public better understand the link between the ionosphere and our technological civilization. The ionosphere is typically neglected in pre-college science classes despite its impact on modern society and the substantial resources invested by funding agencies on furthering our understanding of this atmospheric layer. Our approach is to increase student understanding of the terrestrial ionosphere and Sun-Earth connections through strong connections to existing pre-college curricula and standards. We have created a partnership between the William B. Hanson Center for Space Sciences and the Science Education Program within the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) to produce a quality Educator Guide and a Summer Educator Workshop. A senior graduate student in physics and an experienced middle school educator in UTD's Science Education Master of Science Teaching Program have been partnered to ensure that our the Educator Guide and Workshop will contain both science and pedagogy, and be easily integrated into secondary science classes. The summer 2004 workshop will be offered in the Dallas area, which has a significant population of minority and economically disadvantaged students. We will recruit teachers from districts that serve a large number of underserved/underrepresented students. The Educator Guide and workshop materials will be made available on the CINDI Web site for distribution to a national audience.
UR: http://cindispace.utdallas.edu/
DE: 2435 Ionospheric disturbances
DE: 6605 Education
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting