Jasmin’s Intern Blog: Day 2
- By Jasmin Evans
- October 20, 2015
- Comments Off on Jasmin’s Intern Blog: Day 2
Jasmin shadowed Sara and Maggie for a week in July, learning about outreach, education, and communication at NASA. She wrote blogs about her experience here and we thought you’d all enjoy seeing our world through her eyes. You can find her first blog here. – Maggie & Sara
This morning started off with writing for NASA Blueshift, looking through some of the posts that the other communications interns have written and planning my own. There is also the opportunity to write about astrophysics topics of my choice, and hopefully about all the things that I have learned.
Next, I met with the rest of the team for a meet and greet, where we spoke about the education activities that they undertake and develop. It was very interesting to find out about the projects that they work on, and how these have been distributed to teachers and schools. I was very inspired by their work and look forward to reading through materials to help develop them further, and hopefully further my own understanding of how to do effective outreach with school children. [They include: Imagine the Universe!, Big Explosions and Strong Gravity, Afterschool Universe, and the upcoming Space Forensics.]
Space selfie!
Goddard has a Visitor Center for the general public, which is just outside of the gate. I got to go and have a look around – and take some space selfies!
There are lots of different exhibits, exploring the early days of spaceflight with the Gemini capsule which you can sit in (yes I did), to Earth science and atmospherics, to the astrobiology walk outside around a Delta-B satellite launch vehicle.
The new James Webb Space Telescope exhibit had just unofficially opened too!
Currently the Visitors Center is being redesigned so that it can house new exhibits that were designed by the education team I am working with! These are mostly about astrophysics, and there was a beautiful galaxy image panel that had just been put up in preparation as the backdrop. [Ed note: The exhibit is open now!]
Outside of the Center, rooted in the grass and blowing gently in the breeze sits The Moon Tree. When Apollo 14 set off for the Moon on January 31st 1971, it carried onboard a seed. This seed journeyed around the Moon in the Command Module, so that on the return to Earth, the seed could be planted and the effects of prolonged periods in weightlessness studied. It was beautiful to see, a reminder of a legendary era, preserved for all to see forever.
The Moon Tree
