Outreach

I run an outreach program in our department I’ve named ACCORD: the Astronomy Community Center OutReach Directive. In this two-pronged program, students at K12 community centers throughout Dane County visit the astronomy department on UW-Madison’s campus to visit the planetarium and historic Washburn Observatory. Graduate students also travel to these community centers to perform highly-interactive, hands-on activities with the students in a relaxed environment that encourages questions and individual interactions. From using ice cream and Oreos to exhibit planet formation to demonstrating how stellar temperature affects their color using a lightbulb, students learn to connect astronomy to the world around them in intuitive ways.