We are now well into December and the Holidays are right around the corner! To one section of the population that only means one thing! Time is running out before the Blue And Gold Banquet season is upon Cub Scout Troops everywhere!

As we grow close to the end of 2011 we are looking back and we are pretty geeked about some of our accomplishments this year! Number one among them is the fact that we are still here! 

Recently, in an entry dealing with the Chinese space program, we touched on the need to support science instruction in schools. We wrote about the ways in which curriculum instruction is supported by a visit from a portable planetarium such as our Sky Dome. Today we would like to continue the same theme but in a different area.

I don’t know if you caught this but it took me by surprise. China recently launched a piece of a future space station into orbit. Coming as it does on the heals of the end of our Space Shuttle program it kind of rocked me back on my heels a little.

Continuing today in the theme of exploring how school assembly programs augment the learning process in terms of state academic standards, we turn to Indiana.
In Social Studies, along with many other states, Indiana fourth graders are required to learn about Indiana state history. In particular , the very first section, Standard 1, and the very first two bullet points read as follows:
- Identify and compare the major early cultures that existed in the region that became Indiana prior to contact with Europeans
Example - Paleo-Indians such as Hopewell, Adena, and the Mississippian cultures
- Identify and describe historic Native American Indian groups that lived in Indiana at the time of the European exploration, including ways these groups adapted to and interacted with the physical environment. (Individuals,Society and Culture)
Example: Miami,Shawnee, Potawatomi and Lenape (Delaware)
There is more,but you get the point. Grade 4 is expected to learn about the native tribes indigenous to Indiana. Further exploration of the standards shows that grades 3 and 5 also cover this same material, as does Piankeshaw Trails, Mobile Ed’s new program specifically designed to teach kids about the native tribes of the Ohio valley including Indiana. All the points above are covered in this awesome and exciting program and a lot more. And the presentation is so much fun the kids don’t realize they are learning!
Now lets look at Science.

It is July 8, 2011 and as I write this it is a little before 9 AM Eastern Standard Time. In a few hours the space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to lift off on it’s final mission, and what will be the last mission of the thirty year old space shuttle program.

As things stand, bad weather may delay the launch. There is currently a 70% chance of a delay. Weather is crucial as the conditions must be right not only at Cape Canaveral where the launch is to occur, but also at all of the possible landing sites around the globe. It is a logistically difficult arrangement.

Regardless of whether the launch occurs today or not, it will occur at some point and when Atlantis subsequently returns to earth the entire shuttle program will be over.

In some ways this is a sad moment in our history. Though the shuttle program was created with the express purpose of enabling the construction of the International Space Station, and though this task is now complete, to many of us this seems to signal the end of the era of United States space exploration.

With a poor economy and tightening government budgets the entire NASA program is being examined and some believe we can no longer afford the luxury of venturing into space with humans.
Personally, I hope they are outvoted and that human colonization of space continues, for a multitude of reasons, too lengthy for this article.

But in another way, I worry about the future of American dominance in science and technology. Every year our colleges and universities churn out thousands of scientists and engineers, but many and possibly most are of foreign origin and many of these return to countries such as China, India and Japan upon completing their studies. There they contribute to the rising power of their own nations in Science and technology. While in the meantime our own young people find less and less interest in these crucial fields preferring sports or entertainment as possible careers. Science is not “cool”.

We recently announced the beginning of school assembly scheduling for the 2011-2012 school year. For our client schools in the great state of Texas, and for all the other fine schools there who have not yet tried one of our awesome school assemblies, here is some fantastic news!

Boy this recession has been a killer! All over the country and especially here in the Midwest, state governments facing red ink have been slashing school budgets. Funding is down. Teachers are laid off. It is a mess! And it is the kids who suffer.