STEM Summer Academy on the Navajo Reservation

The US Rosetta Project is the NASA contribution to the International Rosetta Mission, an ESA cornerstone mission to comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. While the project's outreach efforts span multi-media, and a variety of age and ethnic groups, a special emphasis has been made to find a way to provide meaningful outreach to the reservation communities. Because language preservation is an issue of urgent concern to the reservation communities, and because Rosetta, uniquely among NASA missions, has been named after the notion that keys to missing understanding of elements of the ancient past were found in the language on the original Rosetta stone, the US Rosetta Project has embarked upon outreach with a focus on STEM vocabulary in ancient US languages of the Navajo, Hopi, Ojibwe, and other tribal communities as the project expands. NASA image and science are used and described in the native language, alongside lay English and scientific English curriculum elements. Additionally, science (geology/chemistry/botany/physics) elements drawn from the reservation environment, including geomorphology, geochemistry, soil physics, are included and discussed in the native language as much as possible — with their analogs in other planetary environments (such as Mars). In this paper we will report on the most recent Summer Science Academy [2012], a four week summer course for middle school children, created in collaboration with teachers and administrators in the Chinle Unified School District. The concept of the Academy was initiated in 2011, and the first Academy was conducted shortly thereafter, in June 2011 with 14 children, 3 instructors, and a NASA teacher workshop. The community requested three topics: geology, astronomy, and botany. The 2012 Academy built on the curriculum already developed with more robust field trips, addressed to specific science topics, additional quantitative measurements and activities, with more written material for the cultural components from Navajo contributors. In 2012, the Academy was conducted with 45 children and 4 instructors. Following up on lessons learned in previous reports, it is clear that community involvement and buy-in is critical to the success of the program. This means that the US Rosetta Project modified its goals and curriculum to accommodate the teaching desires of teachers in the district, and the capabilities of the medicine men that agreed to participate. The use of NASA material and imagery can be shown to have a positive impact on the accessibility of the overall STEM material. Metrics used in the program will be discussed. Future work to extract STEM language elements to enhance the program will include organized Elder's Round Tables for discussion, and recording, of language with first speakers. Work on this project was supported by NASA at California Institute of Technology/Jet Propulsion Laboratory.