CHAMPLIN, Minn. – Space: it’s often referred to as the final frontier. However, for students visiting the observatory at Jackson Middle School, exploring our universe is all part of a day’s work.
Coordinator Dee McLellan teaches a wide variety of classes at the observatory, all of which are aimed at increasing students and community members’ knowledge about space. “One of the big things about this place is to engage students and inspire them so that they’re interested in learning” states McLellan.
Students from University Avenue Elementary School, located in Blaine, visit the observatory three times per school year. The school was recently converted to a magnet school with an intensive focus on aerospace, engineering, and science, and currently has 525 enrolled students in grades K – 5. University Avenue Elementary Curriculum Integragtion Coordinator Michelle Zimmerman notes that although students are taught the entire standard curriculum determined by the Anoka-Hennepin School District, their learning experience is unlike any other. “As part of the aerospace and engineering component of our school, we also work really hard with the classroom teachers to integrate that into all areas of our content.” Zimmerman says that teachers typically integrate high interest, non-fiction aerospace texts into reading units; math units frequently include numbers pertaining to distance and measurements represented in the solar system.
The Jackson Middle School Observatory boasts a 14-inch Meade Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope with a retractable dome and Deep Sky Imager. The telescope is able to view planets, asteroids, and comets, and contains a time-lapse photography component. It also contains a digital planetarium, which allows students to explore space as first-hand observers. This particular kind of device is known as a GeoDome, and is the only one of its kind in the state. As for the observatory itself, it too exists in a class that is all its own. “It’s a very unique thing” McLellan explains. “I actually cannot tell you of another middle school in the country that has an observatory attached.”
The Jackson Middle School Observatory is open to all school groups in the Anoka-Hennepin School District. Public viewings and classes for community members are also available.
Related Links:
Jackson Middle School Observatory
University Avenue Elementary School
NASA
