It is called the "Information Age." This revolution throughout the 1990s is founded on
a simple truism: Knowledge is power.

From far-flung locales, be it in the home or classroom, students have access to the latest NASA findings and observations. NASA is working with teachers and others in the academic community to inspire America's students and create an array of learning opportunities. The space agency is committed to help enlighten inquisitive minds and involve teachers and students in endeavors that seek answers to fundamental questions of research and science.

This search for educational resources beyond today's traditional learning centers is crucial. The nation must stay on the winning side of the observation made by writer, H.G. Wells: "Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe". The Strategic Plan for Education was developed to guide the nine NASA field centers and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Science, mathematics, and technology education programs and activities are now underway at elementary, secondary, undergraduate, and post doctoral levels. While impossible to adequately portray all the initiatives, the following projects highlight the types of programs that exemplify NASA's resolve to strengthen the educational foundation of the country.

Available through the powerful Internet, connections to over 13,000 files of space-related material via NASA Spacelink is maintained by the Marshall Space Flight Center. This aeronautics and space resource for educators has been up and running since 1988. Among its features are text-only sites that provide a user with the option of speed without graphics, making it compatible with older technology and offering greater accessibility for the visually impaired. A special search engine permits faster searches, providing "results ranking," "natural language" querying, and the ability to search hundreds of other NASA sites on the Internet in addition to the Spacelink library.

Goddard Space Flight Center is creating a low-cost weather station for schools, tuned to geostationary weather satellites. A prototype system has been installed at a neighboring high school. Once trial-tested, an entire network of schools can be interlinked via low-cost satellite receiving stations, enhancing the applicability of using real-time satellite weather data for academic use in schools. Such inter-school links can promote project-oriented learning. Students can learn about meteorological science, computers, teamwork, meeting schedules and objectives, and documenting results.

The NASA-funded Classroom of the Future (COTF) at Wheeling Jesuit College, Wheeling, West Virginia, is providing technology-based tools and information to kindergarten through twelfth grade (K-12) students. COTF's primary mission is to harness advanced computer, video, and telecommunications technologies to help enhance the learning and teaching process for math, science, and technology. COTF is exploring a range of multipurpose, multimedia educational tools for use in teacher training and has established itself as a leader in the field.

Working with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), undergraduate and high school students can get an incredible view of the Earth when a Space Shuttle mission is underway via the KidSat mission operations center at the University of California at San Diego (UCSD). While a Space Shuttle is orbiting the Earth, a KidSat mission operations team electronically targets a digital still-camera aboard the space plane, snapping images of selected spots on Earth. These images are then relayed to the KidSat mission control at UCSD, operated by middle school students, and posted on the Internet for students to study and analyze. The Institute for the Academic Advancement of Youth (IAAY) at Johns Hopkins University is developing the KidSat curriculum for middle school students and teachers. The JPL-UCSD-IAAY partnership has proven picture-perfect, with students learning about weather phenomenon, geography, patterns of rivers and irrigation fields.

Electronic field trips for students and teachers were organized by Ames Research Center as part of the JASON Project. A JASON expedition to Yellowstone National Park and Iceland was broadcast via satellite linkup to twenty-seven other locations across the country, with students operating a live video camera at the sites. During the live hook-ups, students could join scientists and engineers as they explored hot springs, geysers, volcanoes, and glaciers, asking questions of the experts during the science treks. Ames researchers discussed with students the link between studying these Earth sites and searching for signs of life on distant Mars.

Kennedy Space Center (KSC) engineers and scientists became virtual guest instructors at twenty southwestern Florida middle schools through an interactive science education program through the Internet. A Virtual Science Mentor program, originating from KSC, used the latest in desktop video technology to bring the mentors and science class students together. Under the program, forty KSC mentors and a similar number of middle school teachers were paired to establish topics to be covered, including physics, astronomy, technology transfer, space engineering, and other subjects.

The Affordable Technology to Link America's Schools (ATLAS) program is a commercialization outgrowth of Langley Research Center research within the High Performance Computing and Communications/Information Infrastructure Technology and Applications (HPCC/IITA) Program. NASA and ATLAS share a joint goal: To connect more than 70,000 K-12 school sites by the year 2000. Working with the Virginia State Housing and Urban Development Office, Langley is to provide ATLAS orientation sessions to explain the technology design and applications of Internet access and Intranet services.

Computers originally used by engineers and researchers at NASA's Lewis Research Center have been donated to students attending schools in the Cleveland Empowerment Zone. Strengthening a student's ability to compete in a highly-competitive world is a clear motivation for the program. Some 100 computers from the NASA center were distributed among ten schools in the Empowerment Zone, providing technology necessary to educate young minds for the 21st century.

The Stennis Space Center (SSC) education programs and activities include TREND 2000-The Technology, Research, Education, and Discovery Lab. This effort facilitates the integration of technology into the curriculum by providing innovative and creative classroom strategies using state-of-the-art technology. Another project fused SSC geographic mapping software with the re-creation of Amelia Earhart's aviation quest, giving students and teachers a computer-generated way to study changes in the terrain, and growth of urban areas from Earhart's flight in 1937 to 1997.

Johnson Space Center (JSC) hosts a variety of educational initiatives, providing first-hand teacher outreach programs that relay the latest news on human space flight projects, from the Space Shuttle to the International Space Station. JSC supports an active cooperative student work program, giving college students valuable experience in technical and business fields by working at the center. JSC participates directly with Space Center Houston, a neighboring complex built to handle public and educator interest in NASA and the American human space flight program.

Students Sharing NASA engages high schools students with research activities at the Dryden Flight Research Center. Students in the program collect information about a NASA research project, then use it to develop their own Internet site on the World Wide Web. Teacher enhancement, undergraduate and graduate programs, as well as postdoctoral programs are available at Dryden.

These brief descriptions in no way reflect the total number and scope of NASA-supported educational initiatives. Hundreds of elementary, secondary, and higher education activities and programs constitute the true NASA commitment to improving the knowledge of students and teachers alike.

In the 1990s, America's educational system is being challenged. Exciting and innovative approaches are underway at NASA that can help improve the competitiveness of the United States in the world community.