On the 26th of May, without leaving JPL conference room 180-101, 8 students from the Los Feliz
campus of the Lycee International de Los Angeles (LILA) French/American school were in France;
Virtually, that is. The students participated in a live videoconference with French students
who were attending the Argonautica conference at the Aquarium in La Rochelle, France. Argonautica
is a K-12 oceanography education program operating in France since 2001, and currently being piloted
in the United States. The 6th through 11th grade LILA students, have been working with JPL Ocean
Surface Topography Mission (OSTM) Payload Engineer, Dr. Mohamed Abid on a project to construct a
buoy fitted with several temperature sensors.
Their buoy, when completed will be similar to ones
constructed by French students. During the videoconference the LILA students made a presentation
and heard and saw three French teams present. Since all of the LILA students speak fluent French,
they were able to ask questions in real time and received some great construction and trouble-shooting
ideas for their own buoy. The students and adults on both sides of the Atlantic who participated
considered the videoconference a success and hope to have more such collaborations in the future.
The LILA Buoy Team plans to have their buoy ready for launch by February 2006 as part of an
Antarctic Expedition.
Annie Richardson, Education and Public Outreach Coordinator for the TOPEX/Jason and OSTM projects,
is coordinating the program for JPL. For more information on Argonautica, contact Annie by email
at Annie.Richardson@jpl.nasa.gov, or by telephone at 818-393-1064.
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