Astronaut Abby Aims for Mars
Posted on July 9th, 2019 by Mary Lord
Growing up in St. Paul, Minn., Abigail Harrison dreamed of becoming the first woman to land on Mars. Unlike most aspiring space explorers, however, she pursued her passion. Now 21, Astronaut Abby – the social media presence she created at age 14 to do research for a history project on the International Space Station – has become an influential advocate for STEM education through her speeches, blog, and Twitter posts.
Filed under: K-12 Outreach Programs, Special Features | Comments Off on Astronaut Abby Aims for Mars
Tags: Abigail Harrison, Aerospace Engineering, Astronaut Abby, NASA, National History Day, Programs for Girls, STEM education
A White House directive has NASA recalculating the route toward human exploration of the solar system, starting with returning humans to the Moon.
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Apollo mission to the moon, NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center is hosting an art contest for preK-12 students. Register by June 1 and submit artwork by June 15, 2019. Winning artwork will be displayed at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility Visitor Center.
NASA’s latest Mars lander, which executed a perfect touchdown November 25 after a six-month journey of 91 million miles, is unlike previous robotic explorers. The InSight rover is larded with sensitive instruments designed to dig deep below the surface and investigate the Red Planet’s core, crust, and seismic activity.
Middle school students act as Mars exploratory rover engineers. They evaluate equipment options, determine what parts fit in a NASA-provided budget, and, given a parts list, use these constraints to design, build, and display their edible rover at a concluding design review. Includes link to high-school version of this activity.
Looking for hands-on ways to teach forces and motion or refresh your Earth science lessons with the latest research? NASA’s STEM Educator Professional Development Collaborative at Texas State University has you covered with free webinars, activities, and other useful resources.
Alice Zhai’s curiosity about Hurricane Sandy’s destructiveness led to an outstanding high school science fair project – and a collaboration with a NASA scientist that produced a journal paper outlining a new statistical model for better predicting the economic damage from big storms.
The clear skies above Hawaii’s Mauna Kea make the site ideal for a giant telescope. That’s assuming engineers can shield it from earthquakes, fierce winds, and extreme temperatures.
Turn an empty cereal box into a pinhole projector or choose another DIY project for safely viewing the solar eclipse on August 21, 2017. Don’t forget to look around, too, as your shadow sharpens, the horizon colors with sunset hues, and birds roost! 
