SMD E/PO :: Project :: IRIS Quest Challenge

Program Element / Activity Title:

IRIS Quest Challenge

E/PO Project Name:

IRIS

Contact Information Shown to the Public:

http://iris.gsfc.nasa.gov/education_outreach.html

Program Element / Activity Website:

http://quest.nasa.gov/index.html

Program Element / Activity Partners within NASA:

NASA Quest

Short Description for Projects Page:

The extremely popular and highly successful program of Quest Challenges presents middle-school students and their teachers with an authentic design task associated with a mission. Student groups are introduced to the Challenge via an initial webcast, and subsequently develop a preliminary design, obtain feedback from IRIS team members through a web chat, refine their designs, and then submit them for review and presentation as part of a culminating live webcast. The challenge is designed, developed and implemented by the NASA/Ames Mission E/PO Team (AMET).

Who is the primary audience of your program element / activity?:

Who is the secondary audience of your program element / activity?:

What are the goals and objectives of your program element / activity?:

Goal: Provide middle school students with authentic first-hand opportunities to participate in NASA mission activities. Objective: The commitment of at least one IRIS mission team member to review student designs and participate in a one-hour chat and two one-hour webcasts.

What are the main impacts of your effort to date and how do they correlate to the project’s goals and objectives:

1) 300 teachers registered for the Challenge, and they reported a sum total of 13,000 students. 2) 123 teachers responded to the pre-Challenge teacher survey (2,500-3,000 students). 3) 33 teachers responded to the post-Challenge survey (estimated 800-1,000 students). 4) At least 1,000 students participated in the Challenge to varying degrees.