NASA Student Mars Project Wins Education Award

Feb. 21, 2013

Dwayne Brown
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

Guy Webster
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6278
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

RELEASE: 13-061

NASA STUDENT MARS PROJECT WINS EDUCATION AWARD

WASHINGTON -- A NASA project that allows students to use a camera on a
spacecraft orbiting Mars for research has received a new education
prize from the journal Science.

NASA's Mars Student Imaging Project (MSIP), a component of NASA's
Science Mission Directorate education and outreach activities,
enables students from fifth grade through college to take an image of
the Red Planet's surface with a camera aboard NASA's Mars Odyssey.
Students study the image to answer their research questions. After
the image comes back to Earth, the students are some of the first to
see the picture and make their own discoveries.

Established in 2012, the journal's Science Prize for Inquiry-Based
Instruction encourages innovation and excellence in education by
recognizing outstanding, inquiry-based science and design-based
engineering education modules. A panel of scientists and teachers
selected MSIP as one of 12 education projects from fields such as
biology, chemistry, physics and Earth sciences.

Designed to fit within existing science curricula, MSIP targets
required science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM)
objectives and standards for easy integration into classrooms.
Authentic research is at the core of the award-winning project.

"At a time when the U.S. critically needs to develop the next
generation of scientists and engineers, such student-led discoveries
speak to the power of engaging students in authentic research in
their classrooms today," said Jim Green, director of the Planetary
Science Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
"Not only is the chance to explore Mars motivating, it shows students
they are fully capable of entering challenging and exciting STEM
fields."

Since MSIP began in 2002, more than 35,000 students across America
have participated from public, private, urban, suburban and rural
schools of all sizes, grade levels and student abilities. In 2010, a
seventh-grade MSIP class in rural California discovered a previously
unknown cave on Mars. A student presented their results at a major
planetary science conference.

"The Mars Student Imaging Project is a perfect example of how NASA can
use its missions and programs to inspire the next generation of
explorers," said Leland Melvin, NASA associate administrator for
education in Washington. "If we want our students to become
tomorrow's scientists and engineers, we need to give them
opportunities to do real-world -- or in this case, out-of-this-world
-- scientific research, using all of the tools of 21st century
learning."

MISP is a key component of NASA's Mars Public Engagement Program. The
Mars Education Program at Arizona State University in Tempe, under
the direction of Sheri Klug Boonstra, leads MSIP. Philip Christensen,
principal investigator for the Thermal Emission Imaging System
(THEMIS) visible and infrared camera aboard Odyssey, is MSIP's
mentor.

Orbiting Mars since 2001, Odyssey has operated longer than any
spacecraft ever sent to Mars. The mission's longevity enables
continued science from instruments on the orbiter, including the
monitoring of seasonal changes on Mars from year to year. Odyssey
also functions as a communication-relay service for NASA's Mars
rovers.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., manages
the Mars Public Engagement Program and the Odyssey mission for the
Science Mission Directorate in Washington. Lockheed Martin Space
Systems in Denver built the orbiter. JPL and Lockheed Martin
collaborate on operating the spacecraft.

Information about the Mars Student Imaging Project is available at:

http://mars.nasa.gov/msip

For more about the Mars Odyssey mission, visit:

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/odyssey

For information on the prize and eligibility criteria, visit:

http://www.sciencemag.org/site/feature/data/prizes/inquiry/


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