The SETI Institute’s NAI EPO program provides teacher professional development, supports public talks, and collaborates with the California Academy of Sciences on exhibit development. The SETI Institute also hosts a weekly science radio program, “Are We Alone?"

Teacher PD Institute

Our major teacher professional development (PD) project is the Astrobiology Summer Science Institute (ASSET), a science and teaching program that leverages a nationally field tested, NSF and NASA funded curriculum, Voyages Through Time™ curriculum (VTT).  Underserved and underrepresented school teachers are especially recruited for this Institute which is conducted in collaboration with San Francisco State University, NASA Ames Research Center and California Academy of Sciences. Teacher PD is led by Edna DeVore and Pamela Harman in patnership with NAI scientists at SETI Institute and NASA ARC, and faculty at SFSU.

Teacher PD Short Courses and Workshops:

To conduct short courses and workshops, the SETI Institute EPO scientists and educators have collaborated with most other NAI members:  IPTAI, Marine Biological Laboratory, NASA Ames Research Center, NASA Goddard Space Center, Pennsylvania State University, University of California Los Angeles, University of Arizona, and University of Hawaii. These PD activities are reflecting best practices from the “ National Science Education Standards” for middle and high school science teachers.  The delivery of exemplary PD directly aligns with NASA’s Cross-Agency Support Program Education, Outcome 2: “Attract and retrain students in STEM disciplines through a progression of educational opportunities for students, teachers and faculty.” Venues for these teacher PD activities include NOBCChE, NASA Broker Facilitator DePaul University, ASA Community Science Center, ASSET, AAPT/AAS, Navajo Nation NASA Sustainability Seminar, NABT, and NSTA.  The short courses and workshop offer professional opportunities for underserved and underrepresented educators, and educators of those groups. SETI Institute’s EPO team frequently collaborates with the EPO leaders of other NAI teams to conduct these workshops.

EPO Contributions to the NAI

SETI Institute’s EPO team participates in NAI EPO working groups, developed and contributed to the NAI astrobiology poster for schools, worked upon the revision and standards alignment of the NAI Educator Resource Guide, and is helping to develop the AAAS Concept map correlation for teacher PD activities. In this work, SETI Institute’s EPO team members collaborated with University of Arizona, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, University of Hawaii, University of Washington, and the IPTAI team EPO leads. The SETI Institute EPO team worked with Geoff Haines-Stiles (producer of the Passport to Life series) to transfer his broadcast production, “Looking for Life” into a DVD which was distributed to all NAI teams (via NAI Central) as a useful teaching tool for undergraduates, teachers and high school students.

Voyages Through Time

A High School Astrobiology Curriculum: In partnership with NASA Fundamental Biology, the NASA Astrobiology Institute, The National Science Foundation, The California Academy of Sciences, and San Francisco State University, the SETI Institute developed Voyages Through Time (VTT), a National Science Education Standards (NSES)-based integrated science curriculum for high school centered on the unifying theme of evolution. Scientists, teachers, curriculum writers, and media specialists produced six CD-ROM modules that integrate astronomical, geological, and biological sciences. The sequence of lessons in each module is designed to promote students' understanding of science and skills as defined by the NSES and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Benchmarks for Science Literacy. The six modules, Cosmic Evolution, Planetary Evolution, Origin of Life, Evolution of Life, Hominid Evolution, and Evolution of Technology, use the constructivist approach of engage, explore, explain, elaborate, and evaluate (Biological Sciences Curriculum Study, 1996) as an instructional framework. NAI Central funded the revision and production of the CD-ROM samplers of the curriculum. The samplers provide astrobiology activities for the classroom. The VTT national field test took place from September 2001 through July 2002 in over 60 classrooms in 28 states. Teacher feedback was very positive, and the curriculum was revised following the national test evaluation summary reports. The curriculum was published in August 2003.

Public Presentations

The SETI Institute NAI Lead Team members include PI Mancinelli and Co-I’s Backus, Bernstein, Bishop, Cabrol, DeVore, Freund, Phillips, Rothchild, Summers and Tarter. These scientists are frequent presenters at regional and national events for the public as well as the scientific community. 

California Academy of Sciences

The SETI Institute, like the NASA ARC NAI team, collaborates with California Academy of Sciences to provide information, expert reviewers, materials and support for the development of public exhibits at CAS. The Institute supports the ViewSpace exhibit at CAS, an ongoing, up-to-date exhibit that features NASA space science discovery and exploration.

Alien Earth Exhibit

Alien Earths : Visitors to the exhibition will join the search for planets around distant stars and for life beyond Earth, and will learn about the technology and methods scientists are using to search our galactic neighborhood. Copyright Space Science Institute

The SETI Institute assisted the Space Science Institute in the development and production of “Alien Earths,” a traveling science center exhibit on astrobiology. The exhibition first opened at Lawrence Hall of Science at UC Berkeley in 2005, and subsequently at the Science Museum of Western Virginia (Roanoke, VA), the Louisville Science Center (Louisville, KY), the Museum of Science and Technology (Syracuse, NY), the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History (New Haven CT). June through December, 2006, “Alien Earths” will be on display at the Turtle Bay Exploration Park (Redding, CA), the closest science museum to the Allen Telescope Array, SETI Institute and UC Berkeley’s new radio telescope facility.

Are We Alone? Radio Program

Are We Alone? is a weekly, one-hour radio broadcast produced by the SETI Institute that covers science (primarily astrobiology related topics) and skepticism. The format for the show is primarily interviews of topic experts by the host, Seth Shostak, and the producer, Molly Bentley. Shostak is an astronomer at the Institute, and Bentley is a science reporter for the BBC. The guests are usually from academia, NASA, or research organizations. Once a month, the program presents "Skeptical Sunday," where we take on pseudoscience by discussing topics such as Intelligent Design, the UFO phenomenon, remote viewing, etc. with skeptics and experts. The show has active participation by CSICOP as well as several "personalities" (e.g., astronomer Phil Plait) who contribute regularly to the program. Guests have included Michio Kaku, Craig Venter, Ray Kurzweil, Laurance Krauss, Richard Dawkins, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Paul Davies, and countless researchers and headquarters staff from NASA. The show is broadcast on Discovery Channel Radio Sirius 119. More than 100 archived shows are available for downloading and have been podcast.  On the basis of polls, we estimate that the total audience per show is currently 20 to 50 thousand. NAI provides partial support for this program.