NASA Operation IceBridge In-Flight K-12 Classroom Connections

Since 2012, NASA's Operation IceBridge has used the NASA Mission Tools Suite for Education to conduct frequent live chats with K-12 classrooms all over the world from onboard NASA aircraft flying over the Arctic and Antarctic. The NASA Mission Tools Suite (MTS) is used across most NASA Airborne Science Program missions by scientists, engineers and pilots to support mission planning and situational awareness. MTS for Education (MTSE) leverages this framework for educational purposes, giving students and teachers access to the same data, aircraft location information and communication tools. MTSE allows K-12 classrooms around the world to track NASA aircraft and participate in real-time text chats with mission scientists, engineers, pilots, and others. MTSE leverages the occasional downtime that can occur during long flights (e.g. 8-12 hour days for Operation IceBridge over the poles) by providing an easy way for mission scientists, engineers and others to connect directly with students and teachers while they are actually flying a mission. MTSE takes advantage of the main communication tool Airborne Science teams have to connect with the ground and each other in-flight (Internet Relay Chat) to directly connect them to K-12 classrooms and allow NASA teams to share the excitement of their mission in real-time with students and teachers. Over 10,700 K-12 students from classrooms across North America, South America and Africa have directly connected to the NASA Operation IceBridge team in-flight over the Arctic and Antarctic. We discuss the impact of this educational outreach activity and plans for use in the future.