BACKGROUND TO LEARNING FOUNDATION

The Spacelink Learning Foundation is a not-for-profit, private-sector UK registered charity, dedicated to improving science education in schools and thereby helping to increase the supply of scientists and engineers and the public understanding of science and space.

PREVIOUS USE OF SPACE IN EDUCATION

Students have learnt about the solar system, stars and gravity for many generations, and pioneering of the use of satellites in education began almost as soon as the first Sputnik had been launched in 1961. However, it was not until the late 1970s, when imagery of the Earth from space began to become available, that its potential as a teaching aid started to emerge.

By the 1980s a significant number of UK schools were installing facilities so they could receive live signals or data from existing satellites. The potential of space as a significant and constructive teaching support was being widely recognised. But what was also being realised was the fact that the successful use of space in education depended on it being accessible on a cheap, easy, routine and regular basis by all schools.

Limiting factors included the high cost of satellite activity and the fact that the available satellites were not designed for school education. In addition, there was an almost complete lack of the support materials and services needed by teachers.

Things improved in the 1990s with a number of national and international organisations expressing an interest in helping to introduce space into education. Even so, the use of space and satellites in UK mainstream education is still far less than it could be - particularly because materials specifically tailored for use in the teaching of the National Curriculum and examination syllabuses hardly exist.

The Spacelink Initiative was conceived in an environment where space had been used in a limited but largely successful way in education for 15 years. Whilst highlighting some of the potential benefits to science education, that earlier work also highlighted some serious drawbacks:

• Lack of suitable access to space
  There was not available any satellite designed for easy low cost and effective use by school students, able to support a range of space-related experiments, observations and other activities matched to curriculum requirements, or able to deliver data precisely as needed for effective use in schools.
  
  
• Lack of IT facilities
  A space oriented service necessitated having schools equipped with computers, internet access and equally important, teachers trained in the use of such facilities.
  
  
• School circumstances
  Other constraints on making effective use of space and satellites by schools, such as the lack of appropriate teaching materials or teacher training facilities.
  
  

SPACELINK INITIATIVE

The project that has become the Spacelink Initiative was started by a particularly well-endowed school, which had consistently achieved an above average science take up at A-level which they attributed to their use of a space education programme in their science teaching over more than ten years. The governors of the school considered it was their duty to make their experience more widely available to schools in general.

The initial work programme set out to achieve the following objectives:

• To develop a concept for the world's first education payload and ultimately a dedicated satellite
  
  
• To determine how the potential of space and satellites to service education could actually be used, given the realities of day-to-day school life.
  
  

Members of the Spacelink Learning Foundation have led this work which, along with UK government initiatives, has shown that delivering a meaningful space related education service is entirely possible. The previously identified drawbacks/barriers to successful implementation of such a service have been specifically addressed in Spacelink's plans as briefly indicated below.

The Foundation plans to establish the world's first education payload on a suitable host satellite, subsequently enhancing the service by developing in conjunction with international partners a dedicated satellite. This approach will ensure that the Learning Services will be continually enhanced and made yet more cost effective through collaboration with teachers and partners in other countries.

The Foundation will specify the design criteria for the Learning Service to ensure that space can be used effectively in, and is affordable in the first place by all UK schools. This will be achievable by taking advantage of the latest developments in satellite and communication technologies, plus the international adoption of the Internet as a low cost way to deliver real time mass communications.

Spacelink's services will also draw on and complement the UK government's school computer and National Grid for Learning initiatives, which have enabled all UK schools to be fully PC equipped and with teachers trained in the necessary skills.

© 2005 Spacelink^TM Learning Foundation. All rights reserved.
Duplication only with the permission of the Spacelink Learning Foundation.

Last modified: 17. 11. 04