Teachers in Space

Teacher in Space trainee Pam Leestma has been named by the US Department of Education to receive the National Award of American Stars of Teaching. The award was presented at the National Private Schools Conference in Washington, DC. 

Pam, who has been teaching for 33 years, was chosen for the way she incorporates space into her classroom lesson plans. In addition to teaching, she has served as a part-time flight director at the Challenger Learning Center in Carson and a board member of the Orange County Space Society.

Read more about Pam from the City of Bellflower and the Long Beach Press Telegram.

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A new astronaut program will help inspire American students to study math and science, countering the decline that has produced what experts call “a generation at risk.”

“For almost 50 years, teachers have told students that if they excelled at math and science, they could grow up to become astronauts,” said Teachers in Space project manager Edward Wright. “Up to now, that has mostly been a false hope.

“Even at the height of the Shuttle program, a student had a better chance of becoming an NBA basketball star than a NASA astronaut. What kind of message does that send to the next generation?”

“We want to turn that around,” said Rick Tumlinson, co-founder of the Space Frontier Foundation and a Teachers in Space advisor. “American industry is developing a new generation of reusable suborbital spacecraft, which promise dramatic improvements in cost and safety. We will use these spacecraft to fly large numbers of teachers in space and put those teachers right back into the classroom where they can share the excitement, knowledge, and experience of space travel.

“Imagine a thousand astronaut teachers in American classrooms, touching millions of students. What effect will that have on math and science education?”

To accomplish that goal, Teachers in Space will eventually need to raise $20 million a year. “That will allow us to fly 200 teachers a year, four from each and every state in the Union,” Wright said.

Response has been positive so far. Five aerospace companies that are developing suborbital vehicles have pledged flights to the program, and the United States Rocket Academy has purchased additional flights for Teachers in Space and other educational programs. Simultaneously, teachers have started to submit applications for the first Pathfinder Teacher Astronaut flights, which are expected to occur in 2010 or 2011.

Pathfinders will be the first Teacher Astronauts to fly in space and return to the classroom. Later, they will be invited to return each summer to help teach the next class of astronaut teachers.

The deadline for teachers to submit Pathfinder astronaut applications is December 4, 2008. Finalists will be announced and training will begin on selected weekends in 2009. Teachers who are selected will not have to give up their day jobs.

More information about Teachers in Space is available on the project website.

Teachers in Space is a joint project of the Space Frontier Foundation and the United States Rocket Academy.

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Nyack, NY - September 22, 2008 

Teachers all across the country are applying for a new astronaut program.

Teachers in Space is seeking two Pathfinder Astronauts who will become the first astronaut teachers to fly in space and return to the classroom.”Unlike the Educator Astronaut program, which takes teachers out of schools to join the NASA astronaut corps, we want to put astronaut teachers into American classrooms,” said Teachers in Space project manager Edward Wright.

“TIS will allow teachers to keep their day jobs,” Wright said. Pathfinder Astronauts will train on weekends and during the summer, so they will be able to keep their their full-time teaching jobs. “There will be about three weeks of training in total,” Wright said, “which will include both spaceflight training and professional development activities to improve their abilities as teachers.”

After they fly in space, Pathfinder Astronauts will be invited to return each summer to help teach the training course for new astronaut teachers. Eventually, Teachers in Space would like to fly 200 teachers a year, four from each and every state in the Union.

Teachers in Space began as a NASA project to fly a single teacher aboard the Space Shuttle. The original TIS project ended when the Challenger accident claimed the life of teacher Christa McAuliffe. NASA replaced Teachers in Space with the Educator Astronaut program, in which former teachers become full-time NASA employees. The original vision of putting an astronaut back into an American classroom was lost. That vision is now being revived by the new Teachers in Space program, a non-profit project of the Space Frontier Foundation and the United States Rocket Academy.

Rather than relying on the Space Shuttle, the new Teachers in Space program will use the new reusable suborbital spacecraft now being developed by American industry. These new spacecraft, which promise dramatic improvements in cost and safety, will enable large numbers of teachers to fly in space. “We want to put a thousand astronaut teachers into American schools, within the next decade,” Wright said.

The Pathfinder Astronauts will be the leaders who blaze the path for the large number of teachers who follow. 

More information about Teachers in Space is available on the project’s website. 

Teachers can submit applications for the Pathfinder program any time between now and December 4, 2008. Finalists will be announced and training will begin in 2009, which Pathfinder spaceflights expected to take place some time in 2010 or 2011.

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