It's been a busy week at the Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center. Renaissance Academy's Farpoint Voyager Club had three of its six squadrons complete the third round of the 2015-16 Long Duration Mission on the Magellan simulator.
The Lion Squadron (Last Saturday)
The Tiger Squadron (last Thursday)
The Scorpio and Cobra Squadrons will wrap up the third round next week. Rounds four and five are scored. A whole school year's worth of missions rests on the performance the last five hours of flight time.
The pressure builds.
The Order of the Sandwich (Formally known as the Sandwich Club) Gathers to Celebrate Rachel Harken and Aleta Clegg
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| Alex, Matt, Stacy, and Rachel enjoy a laugh. The party was dying down at this point as evident by Stacy's diverted interest. |
The Order of the Sandwich's (Sandwich Club) membership consists of those who were on time card when I worked as director of the Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center. We gather for special occasions, and when I remember that we haven't met for some time, to renew our friendships and keep up on each other's gossip. If you were ever on time card at the Space Center and aren't getting Sandwich Club invites it's because we: 1) didn't like you - which would never be the case; or 2) I don't have your email so you should send it to me.
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| A few of the Order's members tour the Voyager's Bridge |
We gathered last Saturday to welcome former Space Center flight director Rachel Harken home from her LDS mission to Texas AND to celebrate Space Center All Arounder Aleta Clegg's graduation from from BYU's graduate school with her master's degree in science. We met in my classroom at Renaissance Academy so the group could tour the new USS Voyager. My ulterior motive was to remind them of their 'reactivation clause' implied in their original terms of employment, giving me the right to call them back into employment to help operate the Voyager. Most were surprised when informed of that clause. The contractual print required a magnifying glass to read, but they should have known better when dealing with someone like me.
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| Alex DeBirk led the tour. Some opted out and remained upstairs consuming mass quantities of sub sandwich, chips, pickles, and Lorraine Houston's award winning pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. |
The Voyager impressed them all, so I'm hoping the time and expense I endured ordering the sandwich from WalMart, then having to stop and purchase it the following day, along with the pickles, chips and water, and then taking it up the elevator to my classroom and setting it all up will guilt them into returning to the Space Service. Only time will tell.
Mr. Williamson
Dream Flight Adventures' Simulator Inservice Extravaganza
Yesterday Mike Penn and Heather Oros hosted an inservice day for around 100 teachers in Shaler Area School District, Pennsylvania, on their simulator, the IKS Titan.
The teachers attended in groups by grade and specialty. They received a general briefing just like a student would and were assigned a job. Then they “flew” through a sampling of many missions and environments.
They were just as enthusiastic as the kids are! We heard many positive comments. Many of the teachers commented on how they didn’t really understand the simulator until now and that this inservice gave them valuable insight into what their students do and why they are so excited.
There will be lots of brainstorming about how they can use the simulator to bring more relevance and realism their curriculum.
The Imaginarium
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