Saratoga News

Local students explore the ocean with NASA

By John Pancharian

In the depths of Monterey Bay, a sophisticated robot camera surveys deep-sea life as marine scientists all over the nation watch live via satellite link coordinated by NASA. And controlling the robot remotely from Ames Research Center is a really happy-looking grade-school kid.

It is all part of the JASON project, an opportunity for students across the country to enjoy learning about the Earth's oceans and the technology that makes such research possible. Classes from several local schools participated in this year's JASON, including, of course, the Argonauts, as well as Saratoga Elementary, Marshall Lane, Rolling Hills, Sacred Heart and Foothill.

Now in its ninth year, the JASON project consists of a network of 29 locations linked by satellite. At each location, schoolchildren gathered to watch live video-feed broadcasts by research teams in Monterey Bay and off the coast of Bermuda. They were able to direct questions to the scientists at each location during five live broadcasts each day.

The auditorium in which students viewed the broadcast was a technological wonderland. Three screens hung at the front of the dimly lighted space, often with images from different locations displayed on them. Below the screens, technicians maintained the satellite feed with large consoles worthy of any mission control room. A digital camera on one side of the room relayed students' questions to scientists, one of whom, submerged on the coral reef off the south coast of Bermuda, answered from behind his SCUBA mask. As the diver pointed to various sea creatures, students in the auditorium struggled to identify them on worksheets. Four unfortunate volunteers were cajoled into trying "pickles," which turned out to be made of kelp rather than cucumbers.

The enormous and historic Hangar One at Moffet Field was converted into "JASON Harbor," in which students lunched and perused numerous displays. There were underwater photos, a SCUBA gear demonstration, a squid dissection--which was very popular with students--and various scenes created by classes in attendance, including one paper and Styrofoam coral reef scene complete with sand on the floor.

"The kids were thrilled to see their coral reef on display," Melissa Lehochy, a teacher at Blue Hills School, said. She said she thought the event was better suited to middle school students than to her fifth-grade class, but valued the curriculum that led up to the event. Her students did studies of water temperature and depth, created the coral reef and prepared studies on marine animals native to Monterey kelp forests and Bermuda coral.

Anna Rutledge, a teacher at Rolling Hills, also did preparatory projects with her class. "They did a bathematic map of coral reefs off Bermuda," she said. "They looked at fish scales under a microscope and attempted to identify the fish." Her class also experimented with recognizing water from varying depths by its weight and salinity.

The JASON project was founded and hosted by Robert Ballard, famous for discovering the wreckage of RMS Titanic.

For more information, visit the JASON Project Web site.

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