Project ASTRO Baltimore

The Baltimore Project ASTRO partners professional and amateur astronomers with local educators and students. We provide each partnership with materials from the Astronomical Society of the Pacific and assist partnerships in forging effective collaborations; making use of local astronomy resources; and implementing hands-on, inquiry-based astronomy activities in their classrooms.

Our partnering schools include elementary, middle, and high schools in the following school districts:

• Baltimore City Public Schools
• Baltimore County Public Schools
• Harford County Public Schools
• Howard County Public School System
• Prince George’s County Public Schools

We also partner with many private and parochial schools, the Benjamin Banneker Historical Park and Museum, Oregon Ridge Nature Center, and Lake Roland Park.

Our astronomer partners have represented the following institutions:

American Meteor Society Applied Physics Laboratory (JHU) Carnegie Institution of Washington, Department of Terrestrial Magnetism George Mason University Harford County Astronomical Society Howard Astronomical League Lowell Observatory Loyola University Maryland Science Center

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Robinson Nature Center Science Magazine Space Telescope Science Institute Towson University University of Maryland, Baltimore County University of Maryland, College Park U.S. Naval Observatory Westminster Astronomical Society

The Universe at Your Fingertips DVD from the Astronomical Society of the Pacific is provided to all of our partnerships.  It includes 133 field-tested hands-on activities, from programs and projects around the US, 17 topical guides to the best sources of information in print and on the web, 52 background articles on astronomy and education, 10 recommended sequences of activities to help students learn some of the topics most often found in the K-12 curriculum.

Baltimore Project ASTRO educators also have opportunities to:

• Purchase materials for Project ASTRO activities implemented in the classroom using a $100 stipend
• Reserve a classroom set of six Galileoscopes for facilitating a lesson on telescopes with their students
• Reserve a classroom set of eight SunSpotter solar telescopes to use in their classes
• Request free resources and kits from Towson University’s STEM Education Resource Center
• Schedule a Portable Planetarium event for their classes
• Schedule a class visit to the Watson-King Planetarium on the TU campus
• Request a science/physics magic show, given by a TU faculty member
• Request a presentation and activity led by a meteorite expert from the American Meteor Society