Life on the New USS Voyager. Twenty Seven Long Duration Mission Squadrons. A Whole New Way to Fly. Theater Imaginarium.

Farpoint's 6th Grade Phoenix Squadron

The Farpoint Space Education Center's Long Duration Mission Program, A Whole New Way to Experience a Space EdVentures Simulation 

Hello Troops,
We are well into the new Long Duration Mission program at the Farpoint Space Education Center located at Renaissance Academy in beautiful Lehi, Utah; minutes away from Thanksgiving Point and Utah's Silicon Slopes.  Farpoint is home to the new USS Voyager starship simulator. Farpoint offers local students two after school space clubs: SpaceGuard and Project Voyager. 

Farpoint's 5th Grade Scorpion Squadron

SpaceGuard is the Long Duration Mission program (LDM) for grades 3 to 9.  Renaissance Academy has 250 students in the club - divided into 27 squadrons of 9 students each.  The squadrons meet five times during the latter half of the school year. We started at the end of January and will end in May. The cadets attend classes and go on missions in the Voyager. The LDM rotation consists of a training class, then the first half of a mission, followed a few weeks later by a debriefing with additional training, which is then followed a few weeks later with the second half of a mission.  The squadrons have a final meeting/ training in May. Next year Spaceguard will start in September - giving the squadrons more missions, trainings, and classes.  

Farpoint's 4th Grade Cobra Squadron

This method of flying is possible because Farpoint is a school centered program, different than the Christa McAuliffe Space Education Center which serves over sixty schools in the Alpine School District.  The CMSEC excels in field trip operations, private missions, and camps.  Farpoint excels in the LDM methodology.  We have the ability to focus on a small number of students, giving them a prolonged exposure to experiential education through simulations.  We're exempt from the two hour rush required to put students through a short once in a lifetime school field trip mission. Because we serve just the students in our school, an LDM can last up to ten hours spread out over an entire school year, which is then repeated year after year throughout the student's tenure at our school.  A simulator reaches its full potential with this kind of program. 

Farpoint's 6th Grade Tiger Squadron's Commanders

We already see the results at Renaissance. Student reactions to their first missions and classes are contagiously enthusiastic.  Farpoint's sister center at Lakeview Academy in Saratoga Springs also operates an LDM program and has been doing so for three years to overwhelming success.  For schools with InfiniD Labs, the Long Duration Mission methodology is the curriculum and philosophy. 

Fairpoint's 6th Grade Tiger Squadron

Watch one of Farpoint's squadrons as they prepare to undertake their first mission on the USS Voyager. The Lion Squadron's members all come from my sixth grade classes. They're a great group of kids.
  

   

Theater Imaginarium
The best gifs of the week edited for classroom use.