The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is the science operations center for the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), science operations and mission operations center for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and science operations center for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. STScI was established in 1981 as a community-based science center that is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA). STScI's offices are located on the Johns Hopkins University Homewood Campus and in the Rotunda building in Baltimore, Maryland.
Science education is the teaching and learning of science to school children, college students, or adults within the general public. The field of science education includes work in science content, science process, some social science, and some teaching pedagogy. The standards for science education provide expectations for the development of understanding for students through the entire course of their K-12 education and beyond. The traditional subjects included in the standards are physical, life, earth, space, and human sciences.
The Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is a major NASA space research laboratory located approximately 6.5 miles (10.5 km) northeast of Washington, D.C. in Greenbelt, Maryland, United States. Established on May 1, 1959 as NASA's first space flight center, GSFC employs about 10,000 civil servants and contractors. Named for American rocket propulsion pioneer Robert H. Goddard, it is one of ten major NASA field centers. GSFC is partially within the former Goddard census-designated place; it has a Greenbelt mailing address.
The SETI Institute is a not-for-profit research organization incorporated in 1984 whose mission is to explore, understand, and explain the origin and nature of life in the universe, and to use this knowledge to inspire and guide present and future generations, sharing knowledge with the public, the press, and the government. SETI stands for the "search for extraterrestrial intelligence".
The Astronomical Society of the Pacific (ASP) is an American scientific and educational organization, founded in San Francisco on February 7, 1889, immediately following the solar eclipse of January 1, 1889. Its name derives from its origins on the Pacific Coast, but today it has members all over the country and the world. It has the legal status of a nonprofit organization.
The Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE) Program is a worldwide hands-on, science and education program focusing on the environment, now active in over 120 countries worldwide. It works to promote the teaching and learning of science, enhance environmental literacy and stewardship, and promote scientific discovery. Students and teachers collect data and perform research in collaboration with scientists from numerous international agencies, and their work is made accessible through the GLOBE website.
The Lunar and Planetary Institute (LPI) is a scientific research institute dedicated to study of the solar system, its formation, evolution, and current state. The Institute is part of the Universities Space Research Association (USRA) and is supported by the Science Mission Directorate of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Located at 3600 Bay Area Boulevard in Houston, Texas, the LPI is an intellectual leader in lunar and planetary science. The Institute serves as a scientific forum attracting world-class visiting scientists, postdoctoral fellows, students, and resident experts; supports and serves the research community through newsletters, meetings, and other activities; collects and disseminates planetary data while facilitating the community's access to NASA astromaterials samples and facilities; engages and excites the public about space science; and invests in the development of future generations of scientists. The LPI sponsors and organizes several workshops and conferences throughout the year, including the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC) held in March in the Houston area.
NASA's Independent Verification & Validation (IV&V) Program was established in 1993 as part of an agency-wide strategy to provide the highest achievable levels of safety and cost-effectiveness for mission critical software. NASA's IV&V Program was founded under the NASA Office of Safety and Mission Assurance (OSMA) as a direct result of recommendations made by the National Research Council (NRC) and the Report of the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Since then, NASA's IV&V Program has experienced growth in personnel, projects, capabilities, and accomplishments. NASA IV&V efforts have contributed to NASA's improved safety record since the program's inception. Today, Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) is an Agency-level function, delegated from OSMA to Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) and managed by NASA IV&V. NASA's IV&V Program's primary business, software IV&V, is sponsored by OSMA as a software assurance technology. Having been reassigned as GSFC, NASA IV&V is Code 180.
Scientific literacy or science literacy encompasses written, numerical, and digital literacy as they pertain to understanding science, its methodology, observations, and theories. Scientific literacy is chiefly concerned with an understanding of the scientific method, units and methods of measurement, empiricism and understanding of statistics in particular correlations and qualitative versus quantitative observations and aggregate statistics, as well as a basic understanding of core scientific fields, such as physics, chemistry, biology, ecology, geology and computation.
Science outreach, also called education and public outreach or simply public outreach, is an umbrella term for a variety of activities by research institutes, universities, and institutions such as science museums, aimed at promoting public awareness of science and making informal contributions to science education.
NASA's Education and Public Outreach (E/PO) group at Sonoma State University, founded in 1999, is a provider of educational materials for students, educators, scientists, and the public. Funded by NASA and the United States Department of Education, employees work together to create educational guides, fact sheets, worksheets, posters, games, and informational websites. Most of these educational materials are related to the four major missions that support the group: Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Mission, XMM-Newton, and NuSTAR.
The JASON Project is a US K-12 science curriculum program that is designed to motivate and inspire students to pursue interests and careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
A virtual school library is a PreK-12 library that is a subunit of a virtual school—using the same telecommunications network to provide equitable access to electronic resources and communication designed to support the school's curriculum.
The NASA Real World - In World Engineering Design Challenge is an academic activity made for students in grades 7–12. It aims to develop skills relevant to careers in STEM fields. The activity has two phases: project-based learning and team competitions. Students solve engineering problems and collaborate with university students and engineering mentors in virtual reality. The focus revolves around topics related to the James Webb Space Telescope and the Robonaut 2 humanoid robot. The RealWorld - InWorld is a collaborative educational program between NASA, the National Institute of Aerospace (NIA), and USA TODAY Education. It builds upon the Sight/Insight design challenge developed by NASA and USA TODAY Education, as well as the Virtual Exploration Sustainability Challenge (VESC) developed by NIA and NASA.
Kenneth Lafferty Hess is an engineer, author, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. Hess is the founder and president of Science Buddies, a non-profit organization dedicated to furthering science literacy through the creation of free resources and services for K-12 students, teachers, and families. He holds one of the first software patents ever granted and has designed and/or developed dozens of commercial software, content, and Internet products, including Family Tree Maker, one of the all-time best-selling home software programs. Among his awards are a PC Magazine Editor's Choice, PC Magazine Top 100 Web Site, a Codie award and a Science Prize for Online Resources in Education (SPORE).
SciGirls is an American live-action/animated children's television series that premiered on February 11, 2010 on PBS Kids Go!. It has a mix of live-action and animated segments. It is produced by Twin Cities PBS and builds on the "real kids doing real science" approach of DragonflyTV.
Valerie L. Thomas is an American data scientist and inventor. She invented the illusion transmitter, for which she received a patent in 1980. She was responsible for developing the digital media formats that image processing systems used in the early years of NASA's Landsat program.
The DO-IT Center is based at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1992, DO-IT’s mission is to increase the successful participation of people with disabilities in postsecondary education and careers, in STEM fields and careers, and in computing fields and careers throughout the U.S. It directs the national AccessSTEM program, and co-directs the national AccessComputing Alliance focused on engaging people with disabilities in computing fields.
PhET Interactive Simulations, a project at the University of Colorado Boulder, is a non-profit open educational resource project that creates and hosts explorable explanations. It was founded in 2002 by Nobel Laureate Carl Wieman. PhET began with Wieman's vision to improve the way science is taught and learned. Their stated mission is "To advance science and math literacy and education worldwide through free interactive simulations."
The College of Education at Louisiana Tech University is one of the five colleges comprising Louisiana Tech University. The mission of the College traces back to the origins of Louisiana Tech in 1894, where the preparation of teachers was a mission of the institution. Today, the College of Education consists of three separate departments awarding thirty-five different academic degrees ranging from the baccalaureate to the doctoral levels.
