Museum expands astronomical education
Greg Brown, experience coordinator with the Armstrong Air & Space Museum, updated St. Marys Rotarians on Wednesday on what the museum is working on next as it looks ahead to 2021.
Outside of its duties as a daily hub of education and information for everyday visitors, the nearly 50-year-old museum has focused on expanding its astronomical education. Since Dante Centuori was hired as executive director in 2019, the museum has taken more to Centuori’s strengths as an educator in the field dating back to his days as a student at Yale and his work with various science museums.
“He is a good fit for our museum,” Brown added.
And with 25 Ohioans becoming astronauts — the fourth- most for any state in the United States — there has proved to be a need to educate youth in astronomy. Brown added the museum is capable of doing a lot more things with education than it has done in the past.
“With Ohio being the birthplace of aviation, we feel this is probably the strong motivation for many people in Ohio becoming astronauts,” Brown added.
The museum takes part in the Summer Reading Program, where educators will hold lessons with kids at libraries across Ohio. The museum also hosts many school groups throughout the year, such as boy and girl Scouts, ROTC, Civil Air Patrol and senior citizen groups, although Brown added the coronavirus pandemic has curtailed that this year.
“We have a lesson or two for Scouts. We help them work on their aerospace badges and, of course, we give them tours,” Brown said.
Annually hosting those groups requires facilities to be updated.
Brown showed Rotarians pictures of the museum’s old classroom up to 2018-19, noting how the small classroom was not well equipped and poorly ventilated.
“I hate to say this, but this was a lousy place to try to educate a bunch of kids,” Brown stated.
Since the expansion, however, the classroom has been changed into an office area and the museum added a 1,600 square-foot multipurpose STEM inspiration center in its place. Brown pointed out that the center is not only a classroom but can also serve as a meeting place with a wall divider in the middle to allow both rooms to be used simultaneously.
Construction began in November 2018 with poured concrete and walls constructed for the center by February 2019.
Phase II of the expansion project was to be completed as extra exhibit space in 2022 in time for the museum’s 50th anniversary, but with the coronavirus pandemic limiting the state’s funding, Brown said he was not sure that phase of the project was going to happen on schedule.
“However, that is in the near future and that is something we plan to eventually do,” he added.
But the expansion has allowed the museum to create the educational environment it has been striving for since Centuori came on as Brown gave examples of using the museum’s 3-D printers to teach kids how to program and draw various objects.
The museum also has a full-scale lunar rover vehicle, a replica of what Apollo 11 used in their trip to the moon, that the museum uses to teach kids about engineering in the 1960s.
Looking ahead, Brown talked about the museum’s efforts to begin distance learning via Zoom to bring astronomy education across the world. The program, Brown said, is expected to be rolled out in March.
“And we will be able to conduct a lot of distance learning with a lot of different groups,” Brown concluded.
The museum is also looking for volunteers to continue to help with its goal to expand its educational programs. Brown, who said he trains volunteers and works on a lot of content for the museum, can be reached at experience@armstrongmuseum.org or by phone at 419-738- 8864.