Challenger Center lifts student skills

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - With its last mission planned for later this year the space shuttle Endeavour's days of flight are numbered. But that doesn't mean a love for space will be grounded, as News 13's Deanna Sauceda found with a new education program in Albuquerque.

The Challenger Learning Center has just opened at the Unser Museum in the North Valley. This experience for middle-school students is aimed at getting kids interested in math, science and engineering.

The Challenger name evokes a tragic day, Jan. 26, 1986, when the shuttle Challenger split apart before the eyes of the world barely a minute after lifting off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Out of that tragedy came a need to remember all the crew members but particularly Christa McCullough who was to be the first teacher in space.

"When we lost the Challenger in 1986, the family members met to talk about what they would want as a living memorial for their loved ones," Executive Director Julie Muffler of the Challenger Learning Center said. "Since Christa McCullough was a teacher on board it was already an education mission so it made sense that they would do something educationally."

The living memorial is an educational experience based in a multimillion-dollar center at the Unser Discovery Campus at 1776 Montaño NW. It is the first in New Mexico and the 50th since the centers started in Houston in 1988.

On the day News 13 visited teachers were taking part, but the programs and simulated flights are geared toward middle-schoolers.

"Our goal on this mission is to rendezvous with a comet," Muffler explained. "So we are going into space, we're going to get a probe built, we're going to launch it into the tail and get back to earth safely."

Students will do experiments in the space module and send the data to their counterparts in mission control. In the real world that would be thousands of miles away on earth. Here it is on earth, and just a room away.

In one experiment the kids are testing the purity of their food source.

Its estimated 10,000 students will be able to go through the program every school year. If they don't' get it in school they can do it during summer camp.

The students are thrown curve balls and simulated emergencies. NASA is shutting down the shuttle program and plans to rely more on the developing private space industry.

But the crew at the learning center said its lessons are still important.

"For the teamwork, the problem-solving, the communication skills, the responsible decision-making skills, everything you need to have to be a member of a crew," Muffler said.

And the lessons may have a direct impact in New Mexico where the state is developing Spaceport America which already has seen private test launches in Sierra County.

"Being in the industry I think having the access for kids to see what flight is all about, whether it be spaceflight or manned flight, that's an interesting thing for the kids as well as for the aerospace industry which is a growing industry in New Mexico," John uczekaj, president and CEO of Aspen Avionics, said.

The desire to explore space will continue, it will simply take a different form.

New Mexico's Challenger Learning Center is funded by the Unser family, private donations and development funds from the village of Los Ranchos de Albuquerque .

The center is planning a fundraising event Saturday at its campus. Information is available on the center Web site and by e-mail or by calling 248-1776.