The Design of Discovery Educator Workshop

Written by Nathan Smith on February 12, 2015. Posted in STEM and STEAM.

This fifth annual workshop has a special focus on the engineering solutions associated with space exploration. Participants will investigate what it takes for scientists and engineers to work together to move fantastic ideas from dream to reality to meet the challenges of complex missions.

Attendees will be the first to learn about a new guided engineering, maker-based “design a mission” project to help students understand the relationship between scientific objectives and the engineering and design process.

The Design of Discovery workshop will take place on March 7, 2015, in four locations.
— NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California
— NASA’s Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas
— University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado
— Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Maryland

Participants will hear the latest on emerging science from the New Horizons mission as it begins to return images of Pluto. Researchers will share how the MESSENGER mission will make a big bang when it runs out of fuel after spending four years in orbit and returning ground-breaking science data from Mercury. And attendees will follow the ion-propelled Dawn mission as it nears orbit around dwarf planet Ceres.

All sites offer hands-on activities and resources for K-12 and out-of-school-time educators. The cost of the workshop is $25. Lunch and snacks will be provided. Registration closes on Feb. 20, 2015.

For more information, visit http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/discovery/design_of_discovery.asp.

Please email any questions about the Design of Discovery workshops to Mary Cullen at mcullen@mcrel.org.

Nathan Smith

Nathan Smith is Director of Technology for the College of Education and Human Services at Utah State University. In that role, he also directs The Adele & Dale Young Education Technology Center (The YETC) located in room 170 of the Education Building on Utah State University's Logan campus. The YETC is a combination student openaccess computer facility, a K12 curriculum materials library, a NASA Educator Resource Center for Utah, and a technology training center. Nathan served eight years (20042012) on the Board of Directors for the Utah Coalition for Education Technology (UCET) He was reelected in 2014 to serve another two year term on the board. A former elementary school teacher, Nathan has taught students every age from young children to senior citizens. He has had the opportunity beginning in 2011 to train international high school teachers from all over the world about technology in education, through the U.S. State