| 1. NASA Ames Research Center provided three folks to set up the
fast Internet connections for the exhibit hall. In addition to wiring
the IITA booth, they also connected the entire NASA exhibit area and
selected other exhibitors (like the GLOBE project). This was a big
job to accomplish in a short time. So we called the folks that did
it "The Network Heroes". The heroes are: Tom Dyson (front), Dan Bock
(back left),Robert Kearin (back right). They all work for a company
called I-NET. |
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2. Here is Dan working on the hub for the network. Notice the wire
coming from his ear. This is a cool system of wireless communications
that always kept Dan and Robert in touch. We joked that they needed
to dress in dark suits if they really wanted to pretend they were
Secret Service. But the Network Heroes found the communciation system
to be very helpful in debugging network problems. |
| 3 This is Andrea McCurdy. She works at Ames for the K-12 Internet
Initiative. Her main project now is to finish a public-domain video
which will describe how teachers have successfully incorporated the
Internet into their curriculum. She is also starting a project to
make sure that the Passport to Knowledge summer workshop about Mars
is available over the Internet. For this conference, she helped tell
teachers about what we do. |
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4.This is a picture of the Passport to Knowledge side of the booth
They shared the IITA space. Notice the computers available for giving
hands-on demonstrations. On the left is Jan Wee (our Outreach Coordinator)
and next to her is Geoff Haines-Stiles (the Project Director for Passport
to Knowledge). |
| 5. Here is Geoff in the booth sharing his thoughts with a teacher. |
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6. Jan loved to get teachers to fill out a form to be put on our
mailing list (snailmail, not Email). |
| 7. In the center is Pat Haddon, a middle school teacher from Summit,
NJ. She has helped develop Live From Hubble and skipped school to
staff the booth with us. On the right is Peggy Gebhardt who has been
along on previous Passport to Knowledge adventures; she and her son
Jackie (left) dropped by the booth for a visit |
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8. During the show, we had Frank Owens, the top dog of NASA's Education
Organization from Headquarters (in Washington) visit. Here Frank (left)
is shown speaking with Mark Leon (right). Mark is in charge of the
IITA K-12 program for all the NASA centers. It was his job to pull
together the IITA presence at the NSTA convention....good show. Andrea
is in the middle. |
| 9. Two things made our booth the envy of all the other NASA people.
One was the food. Each day at lunch we had sandwiches delivered. I
don't know if that has ever been done before at a NASA booth. We had
Christiy Budenbender to thank for the food and all of the other logistical
details. Christiy is in the front (with her head cut off...oops, I'm
not a very good photographer). Behind Christiy is Erna Akuginow, who
manages many aspects of Passport to Knowledge project, including television
production. |
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10. Also we had a communication center behind our booth where you
could make private telephone calls or Email. We've pulled back the
curtain on Dan to show off our secret. |
