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Educational Outreach Corner
Galileo Outreach: Bringing Jupiter to Earth and Across the USA
 What is Galileo? Where is it? What is it doing now? What have we learned about Jupiter's fascinating system? What does all this information mean to me?
These are the questions that the Galileo Outreach Team is charged with answering, by putting programs in place that "get the word out" about the Galileo mission. With more consideration being given by NASA to share the excitement of its exploration of space with the public, integrated policies are emerging that encourage the expansion of these activities into new and nationwide markets. Galileo Outreach is responding by strengthening its alignment with the recently published NASA guidelines for "Implementing the Office of Space Science Education/Public Outreach Strategy." We highlight here activities that are representative of the types of programs we are conducting through this alignment.
Ambassadors to Jupiter
The Galileo Ambassador to Jupiter program is a nationwide network of educators from the United States who have agreed to share the excitement of Galileo's exploration with their local community, in exchange for direct mailings of all Galileo outreach products. We have an enthusiastic group of 41 educators from 27 states who are conducting unique activities in many areas of the country that are not typically exposed to the latest in space exploration. In the Boston area, Dan Welty's high school physics students will tell area elementary students about the spacecraft that's orbiting the faraway planet Jupiter right now. In Minnesota, Virgil Boehland will supply the program for the performance of Holtz's "The Planets" by the Duluth Symphony with an internet card displaying the Galileo Home Page address. Cindy Langdon's "one stoplight" town of North Berwick, Maine will learn about Jupiter's atmospheric patterns using Ivory Liquid©. In Little Rock, Charles Hemann, the Assistant Director of the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Planetarium, will conduct a pre- service teacher workshop on "Remote Sensing at Jupiter," and says "Astronomy and space science are the best way of getting anyone interested in science and technology!"
The Ambassador program is planned to expand to two Ambassadors per state in 1998. The current Ambassadors report that their communities are excited by their connection to a current space mission.
Galileo Educator Workshops go Nationwide!
The Galileo Project welcomes the Challenger Center for Space Science Education as an outreach partner. Established in memory of the astronauts who perished in the space shuttle Challenger accident, and committed to promoting science, math, and technology education, Challenger Center disseminates its innovative learning programs through a growing national network of 30 Learning Centers in 19 states. A Challenger Center GEM Educator Team will conduct 45 workshops each year during GEM, featuring Galileo and Jupiter exploration, reaching over 2000 educators across the country.
We also continue our local workshops here at JPL. In December, 225 educators learned about the intense magnetic environment of Jupiter and how it compares to Earth, and several of them shared Jupiter-related activities that they conducted in their classrooms. Future workshops will cover the focussed exploration of Europa, and go interdisciplinary to explore icy places like Europa and the Earth's poles, fiery places like Io and the Earth's volcanoes, and consider the possibility for life in the solar system. We will also be part of NASA's Aerospace Education Services Program, a traveling aerospace education unit that reaches millions of students each year.
Coming Attractions
We are working to add new information to the home page to give an integrated picture, literally, of Galileo's discoveries. We are working with NASA HQ on joint educational and public products based on the results of the mission that will be also integrated onto the home page. We plan to add a model of the Galileo spacecraft that can be downloaded over the internet and printed on your home computer.
Keep up to date with the Galileo electronic mailing list. Subscribers receive daily updates of the scientific observations during encounter periods, weekly status reports, and announcements on special events.
Catch us at the Smithsonian! The "What's New in Space" exhibit in the National Air and Space Museum features the latest images from Galileo.
Plans are still being made for expanding the reach of the excitement of following our live planetary exploration mission as we continue to make new discoveries. Watch for reports in future editions of the Messenger and on the Galileo Home Page.
--Leslie Lowes
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