EDUCATIONAND TOUR PROGRAM
The primary activity of the Education and Tour Program (ETP) is to accommodate and coordinate visits and tours at NCAR's Mesa Lab. Visitors represent a broad range of backgrounds and ages, including the general public, students, and educators at all levels, as well as scientific and other professionals. In 1998 over 12,100 visitors from the U. S. and abroad participated in formal tours and thousands more took self-guided tours. The number of student visitors from preschool through graduate levels increased by more than 7% over the previous year, from 7,067 to 7,581. With the addition this year of two bi-lingual staff--a work study student and a volunteer tour guide--for the first time NCAR can present tours in Spanish or French.
Educators are one of the most important groups of visitors, and NCAR customizes tours and presentations to meet their special needs and interests. Several schools sought out ETP to arrange a more in-depth visit, for at least a half-day, for their own or related teachers, in order to learn more about UCAR as an institution and as a repository of resources including science, technology, career, and course materials. Not only do we take these teachers through various demonstrations and presentations, we also act as conduits between the institution and its other education programs that these teachers normally are unaware of. These include preschool through graduate levels and special groups such as teachers associated with NCAR’s Project LEARN, the American Meteorological Society's Project Atmosphere, and several other teacher training programs. In addition, the Educational Resource Center provides teaching modules and other materials of general interest for educators, students and family members who visit the Mesa Lab.
Examples of special programs for visitors during FY 1998 included:
- An instructor from Metropolitan State College in Denver brought 25 high school and middle school teachers from western Colorado for a career-oriented visit. The primary emphasis was on how teachers can interest students in the variety of careers involved in the enterprise of science.
- An entire school faculty of 45 teachers from the Montessori School of Denver visited NCAR to learn about content in the atmospheric sciences focused at the elementary school level.
- High school teachers from Casper, Wyoming and faculty from Casper College, Wyoming visited NCAR to acquire content materials for teaching science courses. NCAR and UCAR Office of Programs staff shared instructional materials and demonstrated activities related to the teachers’ areas of interest.
Whenever possible the Education and Tour Program also assists visitors with one-on-one visits and special information needs. Some visitors last year included:
- A local teacher who cared enough about one high school student's unmotivated performance brought the student to NCAR to see how academic preparation and technology fit together as a career path.
- A soil sciences college professor who teaches a climatology course at Grand Valley College in Michigan visited NCAR to add to his background in climate change. He was introduced to the learning modules developed by UCAR's Global Change Instruction Program. As a result he has committed to test some of the modules in his upcoming classes.
- A professor of public administration at the City College of New York, writing an article on the organizational structure of national laboratories, needed access to UCAR management for an in-depth interview, to be able to compare NCAR with other national laboratories. Included in his visit was a session with the NCAR Associate Director.
In addition to the ongoing visitor program, ETP continued its other educational activities. In May, NCAR hosted the 12th annual EggDrop Contest. Children of UCAR staff and students at two local elementary schools engineered ingenious entries for the contest.Other activities included the 9th annual Day at NCAR for winners of the NCAR Science Prize at the local regional science fair, and the 3rd annual Career Day in Meteorology for middle school student already committed to a career in meteorology. Finally, the 2nd annual Saturday Science FunDay for children of UCAR staff was jointly sponsored this year with Friends of UCAR.
