The
Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center
Central Elementary
School, Alpine School District
95 North 400 East, Pleasant Grove, Utah 84062
Telephone/Fax: 801.785.8713 • spacecamputah@gmail.com •
www.spacecamputah.org
One
Unbelievable and Educational EdVenture
Christa McAuliffe |
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A Recent Crew of the
USS Voyager |
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USS Voyager Sensors Station |
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The Space Center is a unique and unparalleled experience
that combines the fun of exploration and learning with a simulated
and futuristic adventure story.
Started in 1990, the Space Center began as a classroom
experiment by Victor Williamson. Through the drama of space and the
fun of learning activities, it was discovered how effective simulation
is in education. Starting with nothing more than an overhead projector,
Mr. Williamson turned out the lights of his classroom and took his
students to the outer reaches of our Solar System and beyond. He found that students not only enjoyed the learning experience,
but retained information better than they did when taught conventionally.
With the goal to bring this to students beyond his classroom,
Mr. Williamson sought out various grants and donations to build a
more advanced and larger scale program. A grant from the US West Foundation,
The Christa McAuliffe Fellowship, along with multiple other donations
of personal time were acquired and in early 1990 the construction
of the first simulator began. They called it Voyager after the first deep space mission the United States launched in 1977.
On November 8, 1990 the Voyager was opened for it's
first school flight. Finally Mr. Williamson's dream had come to fruition. He
took his program to Alpine School District and supporters flocked to his cause.
Soon after, classes from all over Utah and as far away
as the former Soviet Union came to experience education in the flight simulator Voyager.
The Voyager simulator served alone until the idea of a second and smaller simulator was envisioned. This
would allow the Space Center to handle larger class sizes from
elementary schools. Mr. Williamson once again jumped at the chance
to be able to serve the student population to an even greater scale.
Through more grants, fund raising and donations of personal time another simulator was built in late 1995--the Odyssey. The two ships
flew next to each other and were able to serve an even greater amount
of classes throughout the school district and state.
Over the years to follow, class sizes grew and so did
the demand for flights deemed not only educational, but fun as well.
Recognizing this need, the "Galileo" was brought on line
in April of 1999. The Galileo brought a new dimension to the Space
Center formula--actual movement.
In the summer of 1999 the Magellan simulator
evolved from a computer lab, serving the public as another large
scale simulator. The Magellan is deemed as the only multipurpose simulator,
serving as Central Elementary's computer lab by day and simulator
by night.
In the summer of 2000, with a $40,000 grant from the
Intel Corporation, the CMSEC brought 2 new StarLab Domes and the activation
of the "Falcon" simulator. Taken as a more modern day approach
to space travel, the Falcon offered a view of what present day space flight may be in the not so distant future.
As part of the Space Center's 15th birthday,
we celebrated the opening of our new simulator the "USS Phoenix."
The Phoenix is often called the most technologically advanced starship simulator
in our fleet and some patrons say the coolest, sighting it's aluminum
deck plating, rounded ceiling and incredible special effects.
One year later, we celebrated our 16th birthday with the grand re-opening
of the "Magellan." The Magellan had been closed for several months and was open
in time for our summer programs, sporting aluminum deck plating, upgraded hardware, an
entirely new set of computer programs.
Using the humanities, social sciences, and space education,
these 6 simulators work collectively to enlighten minds, young and
old, as to what awaits us in the stars and how to apply life's values in real-life situations.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
— Albert Einstein
Space
Center Report
GENERAL FACTS ON THE SPACE CENTER
Celebrating 16 years of Space Education in the Alpine School District
General
Information:
• The Space Center was founded on November 8, 1990
• The Space Center’s total attendance as of January 2007:
195,243
• Total number of classes, workshops, and space simulations:
15,345
• Simulators in use: 6 - Classrooms: 1 - Offices: 1
• Planetariums: Two Starlab Inflatable Planetariums. One used
for in-house field trips and the other is checked out to teachers after
completing our inservice.
• Field Trips are run daily from 9:30 A.M. to 1:30 P.M. The
Center is visited by approximately four hundred students, teachers,
and the general public weekly. Overnight Camps are run from Friday
evenings to Saturday mornings throughout the year. Overnight Camps
are open to students from 10 to 14 years of age. Super Saturday’s
are run every other weekend offering students five hour experiences
in our simulators.
• Private Programs are offered to the public after school hours
and on Saturdays. The Space Center is heavily used by the public.
To accommodate the demand the Center is usually open until 9:00 P.M.
on weekdays and 5:00 P.M. on Saturdays.
• June and July are summer camp months. Over 1,600 students
attend the summer camps of 2006. Summer camps last one to three
days.
• Thursday evenings are reserved for academic classes offered
to the public. Each class lasts four weeks and runs for one and one
half hours each session. Scout Merit Badges can be earned in the classes.
This year’s courses are listed.
1. General Astronomy
2. Space Exploration
3. First Aid
4. Aviation
5. Atomic Energy
The classes are taught by employees of the Alpine School District.
• The Space Center sponsors an advanced math class for sixth
graders at Central Elementary School. The class is taught daily from
1:45 PM - 2:45 A.M.
• The Space Center is funded from the following sources:
1. One FTP from the Alpine School District for the Center’s
Director
2. Grants and donations from businesses, corporations, and patrons.
3. Tuition's from field trips and camps.
• The Center believes students should be involved in all aspects
of day to day operations and program development. Some examples:
1. The Center’s computer simulator programs were authored by
Alpine District students. Every year new students are taught our programming
language in free Saturday classes taught at Central Elementary. The
best are hired to write our programming code for new missions.
2. Four of the simulators have high school flight directors.
3. Many components of the simulators were designed by electrical engineering
majors from BYU’s Electrical Engineering Department. This is
an ongoing collaboration between the Center and BYU.
4. The Center’s simulator ‘Magellan’ was redesigned
and drafted by students from Lone Peak High School’s drafting
and interior design classes. Major sections of the new simulator were
built by Lone Peak High School’s construction class.
5. Three high schools in the Alpine School District use the Center
for work site internships.
6. Pleasant Grove High School’s carpentry class built the furniture
for the Phoenix simulator’s computer desks.
Staff:
• Full time employees: 1
• Part time hourly employees: 17
• Non Central Elementary volunteers (working at least five hours
monthly): 102
92% of our volunteers are Alpine District students in grades seven
through twelve. The volunteers come from many of the District’s
secondary schools.
• Central Elementary student volunteers (grades 5 and 6): 61
Participants:
• All Alpine District elementary schools participate in Center
field trips except Cedar Fort.
• Three Alpine District junior high schools along with several
high schools from the Jordan and Park City School Districts participate
in field trips.
• Ten classes attend the Center’s four hour field trips
weekly.
• 1,458 simulator programs were conducted during the year (2.5
to 5 hours long).
• 14,501 students, teachers, and patrons of the Alpine School
District attended the Center last school year. (classes, workshops,
simulations, and planetarium shows).
• Out of district participants: Park City, Jordan, Provo, Nebo,
Granite, Davis, Weber, Salt Lake City, Murray, and Ogden School Districts.
• Out of state participants: Idaho, Colorado, Nevada, California,
Texas.
• International participants: Japan, South Korea, Russia, Kazakhstan,
Ukraine, Bulgaria.
General
Philosophy:
The Space Center’s mission is to provide multidisciplinary field
trips for students ranging in age from ten to fourteen. The field
trips cover the following disciplines:
1. Science: Students receive ninety minutes of space science lessons
and activities in our Discovery Classroom and our Starlab Planetarium.
2. Technology - Humanities - Leadership - Team Building - Music -
Drama - Social Science: Students receive one hour and forty five minutes
in one of our simulators. The simulated missions take the students
hundreds of years into the future on great starships. These interactive
dramas serve to enforce the science education received in the classroom
along with the technology of the simulators themselves and the interactive
dramas the missions are structured around. The humanities play a major
role in the simulator activity. Each mission is structured around
the social studies curriculum. The missions blend the social sciences
with science and technology creating an experience children never
forget.
Students are encouraged to see space as the final frontier
awaiting discovery. We teach that space isn’t just for astronomers
and astronauts. Space is limitless in expanse therefore it is limitless
in imagination. Space is for the musician, the artist, the writer,
the engineer, the computer programmer, the actor, the brick layer,
the custodian. We live on a great spaceship called Earth. We are traveling
through the
cosmos at unbelievable speeds. Our very atoms were created in the
vacuum of space in fiery supernova explosions. We want students to
leave thinking that space is the future. We want students to leave
the Center thinking education is the key to that future. We are not
in the business of creating astronauts although many students have
expressed a desire to explore that profession after attending our
programs.
We are in the business of creating a space faring population that
embraces the challenge of space and the risks; a population that will
support the nation’s space programs. We teach the Discipline
of What Could Be. We teach the Discipline of Wonder!
CHANGES
TO PROGRAM OFFERINGS AND PRICES:
THE CHRISTA MCAULIFFE SPACE EDUCATION CENTER RESERVES
THE RIGHT TO MAKE CHANGES TO PROGRAMS, PRICING, AND
OTHER TERMS WITHOUT NOTICE AT ITS OWN DISCRETION.
