Two Lawrentians going where they never expected to go
By Cassie Dunham Bowman, ’98
Lawrence Today magazine, Summer 2004
The “Lawrence
Difference” can mean a lot of things: one-on-one
contact with professors; exposure to classic writers and modern theorists;
or the chance to be an academic, a musician, and an athlete all at once. For
Tim Micheau, ’88 (second from right in photo), and me, Cassie Dunham
Bowman, ’98 (second from left),
the Lawrence Difference led us on a trip to Mars.
In April 2003, Tim, a new science teacher at Wheaton-Warrenville
South High School in Wheaton, Illinois, was selected through a competitive
national application process to participate, along with 12 other teachers,
in NASA’s Athena
Student Interns Program, a student-scientist research-partnership program of
which I was the coordinator.
Small groups of students and teachers from around the country were paired
with science mentors to help carry out an aspect of the mission. In the months
leading
up to the Mars landing, they worked with their mentors and with each other
to prepare and then spent time in residence at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), in Pasadena, California, assisting their
mentors in the science and discovery of the mission. They also engaged in
ongoing outreach to their
schools and communities. The program, designed to actively involve high school
students
and teachers in working on the Mars
Exploration Rover mission, provided Tim
and two of his students an insider’s look at doing science on Mars.
They were paired with a researcher at the University of Chicago who is a
member of the Athena Science Team and an expert on the Alpha
Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS). Tim explains that, although he
and his students had very little experience with spectrometers, Mars, or
planetary geology, they gradually were introduced
to such topics through all-team teleconferences, Web materials, and meetings
with their mentor. The experience culminated in a one-week trip to JPL in
March, during which they worked as members of the science team, helping to
chart APXS
data and organize images of the Columbia Hills on Mars — the Spirit
rover’s ultimate destination. Read
excerpts from their journals.
Though it may not be unprecedented for two Lawrence graduates to meet on
the same project, what is surprising is that neither Tim nor I,
who graduated ten
years apart, earned a science degree at Lawrence — or even took many
science classes.
Tim, an economics major, remembers taking physics, introduction to geology,
and environmental chemistry during his freshman and sophomore years. A Spanish
major with an emphasis in education, I fulfilled my distribution requirements
through a seminar on the reintroduction of wolves to Wisconsin with Professor
Brad Rence and an astronomy course with Professor Matthew Stoneking. While
neither Tim nor I converted to science majors, the courses exposed both of
us to the diversity, practicality, and wonder of science — experiences
that we now draw on in our respective jobs.
For Tim, this has meant, among other things, working at an engineering company
for two years, getting a master’s degree in higher education, working
in student support services at several different universities in the Chicago
area for about eight years, trying his hand at financial advising for a couple
of years, and running a learning/tutoring center. He did all of this before
he decided to go back to school and get a second master’s degree in
secondary education, along with a certificate to teach science. He says he
chose to teach
because he has always enjoyed helping others learn and because, more recently,
he has realized that he really likes working with kids. He chose to teach
science because science is always changing and expanding, and it best seems
to satisfy
his hunger for learning new things.
My work, too, is a far cry from what I initially set out to do — become
a high school Spanish teacher. By the end of 1998, I had graduated from Lawrence
and completed the Associated Colleges of the Midwest Urban
Education student-teaching
program in Spanish. Through a mutual friend, I became acquainted with Dr. Raymond
Arvidson, a professor at Washington University in St. Louis and deputy principal
investigator of the Athena Science Payload for the Mars Exploration Rovers.
After conversations about how he could use educational outreach in his work,
he hired me to help develop and coordinate a new student involvement program.
With collaborators at Cornell University, Professor Arvidson and I created
a prototype that eventually would become the Athena Student Interns Program.
Through numerous program changes and moves around the country, I’ve
stayed involved as the coordinator of the program, which concluded this year
with
the Mars Exploration Rover landings.
Tim and I agree that that the experience of the Athena Student Interns Program
had an impact on our careers and our understanding of the potential of education.
For me, being involved on so many levels — from the initial development
to the daily interaction with students, teachers, and scientists to using various
evaluation techniques to refine and improve the program — has given me
an intimate understanding of the end-to-end nature of both a research project
and a practical educational program. Questions and puzzles raised by trying
to bridge the divide between school settings and community resources (in this
case, scientists) have led me to return to school twice — once for a
master’s in educational policy and evaluation and currently for a doctorate
in learning and teaching. My strong background in education, provided by classes
in educational methodology, philosophy, and diversity — as well as committed
advising by Lawrence professors such as Stewart Purkey — ingrained
in me a sense of the incredible importance of teachers and of educational
opportunity.
Moreover, I credit my broad liberal arts education at Lawrence for helping
me develop the flexible thinking, inquiry skills, and curiosity that have
allowed me to grasp such unplanned and unimagined opportunities.
For Tim, the Athena Student Interns Program has meant being able to really
understand the process of scientific investigation. Teaching science is very
different from doing science. Having been able to experience this difference
firsthand will help him better engage his high school students in the process
of science. Providing the opportunity for two of his students to participate
in a real space exploration mission was a highlight of his involvement. A
teacher facilitates learning and provides opportunities, and this program
has allowed
Tim to help his students and his community (through numerous community outreach
presentations) learn more about Mars and space exploration. Like me, he feels
that his education at Lawrence provided the skills and tools to take advantage
of any learning opportunity — even a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Mars.
Although the Athena Student Interns Program is drawing to a close, for Tim
and me, the connection to Mars will continue. He plans to start a Space Club
at his school, getting involved in other NASA activities such as the Mars
Student Imaging Program and perhaps even a robotics
competition.
As he continues to teach, he looks forward to bringing the excitement of
space and the experience of hands-on scientific inquiry to as many students
as possible.
I am remaining involved with NASA’s Mars Public Engagement efforts
as I continue my doctoral work, hoping that my research will help me and
others
better understand how to bring opportunities like the Athena Student Interns
Program to greater numbers of students and teachers nationwide.