The Willow Glen Resident

Photograph courtesy of International Space Camp

The Right Stuff: Willow Glen resident Ginger Brown, California's 1998 Teacher of the Year, tests a Manned Manuevering Unit at the ninth International Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala.

WG 'Teacher of the Year' blasts off to Space Camp

By John Pancharian

If being chosen California's 1998 Teacher of the Year wasn't enough to make her feel light on her feet, Ginger Brown's experience at NASA's ninth International Space Camp did the trick. The Willow Glen resident and other star educators from all over the planet, trekked to Huntsville, Ala. to spend eight days training as astronauts and flying simulated shuttle missions. At the end of the camp, Brown said she'd learned the importance of tolerance and cooperation--both in international space projects, and toward the vision-impaired preschoolers she teaches.

"My favorite thing was the micro-gravity," Brown said. After donning a harness to simulate near-weightlessness, she practiced repairs to a satellite. "You wouldn't believe how hard it was just to turn a screw," Brown said, explaining that without anything to anchor her, torquing the wrench also set her body spinning.

NASA operates Space Camps in several U.S. locations, including Mountain View. For a hefty tuition, students and teachers receive an education about space exploration, and the opportunity to play with some of NASA's most sophisticated toys. International Space Camp is not a separate facility, but an annual event to which NASA invites distinguished teachers, foreign and domestic. From July 31 to Aug. 8, teachers of the year from 55 U.S. states and territories, along with a host of international educators, went through the same space camp others do, with an added dose of pomp and hoopla--and without paying tuition.

Following a welcoming speech by shuttle Astronaut Mike Mullane and a colorful opening ceremony on the first day, Brown and her companions settled in for a night's sleep before embarking on their new career as space travelers.

As part of her space-walking practice, Brown also trained with the Manned Maneuvering Unit--the rocket pack astronauts use to fly, untethered, outside the shuttle.

And to acquaint the land-lubbing teachers with the disorientation that comes with space flight, Space Camp instructors placed them inside the Multi-Access Trainer--a large and sophisticated version of the strap-in human gyroscopes popular at amusement parks.

"You don't want to do a Multi-Access Trainer," Brown said without elaborating.

The teachers broke down into teams for simulated shuttle missions, some entering the simulator for an eight-hour flight, while others took positions at mission control.

"It was fun, but very exhausting," Brown said. "You didn't want to disappoint your teammates." She said the Space Camp instructors were very kind, allowing the novice space-travelers to finish their simulations even if they blew themselves up early on.

Brown, who has taught for the past 10 years at Chandler Tripp School in San Jose, began her ascent to educator stardom last September, when the school's principal, Taura Anderson, nominated her as the Santa Clara County Office of Education's Teacher of the Year. Chandler Tripp is not part of any school district but is administered directly by the county office.

"Ginger really makes her students feel they can do things," Anderson said. She explained Brown excels at building self-esteem in her visually impaired 3- to 5-year-olds, as well as imparting the can-do attitude to parents who are still new to raising such a child. Anderson said Brown is also uncommonly proactive about bringing new resources into her classroom.

"Whether it's people, materials or money, she's always there, ready to use it for her kids," Anderson said.

After a complicated application process, and a visit from a state observation team that showed up with little notice while Brown swam with her students, Brown was chosen as one of five California Teachers of the Year for 1998. She was arguably first in a distinguished field because only she attended Space Camp, and she was California's only nomination for the national teacher of the year award.

In addition to their time spent as astronauts, Brown and the other honored teachers have traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet President Clinton. "The staff [at Chandler Tripp] wanted to know if I would bring him back for career day," she joked.

"Frankly, I was scared out of my wits," Brown said. "I just never thought the little schoolteacher would meet the president." Her students were less impressed, however. "They were much more thrilled I'd gotten to meet Buddy and Socks," she said.

Brown will return to Washington in October to discuss the future of American education with officials from the U.S. Department of Education.

Back home in Willow Glen, Brown said meeting such a diverse group of educators at Space Camp reinforced her philosophy as a teacher. "I had a strong sense of no borders," she said. "It made me realize it's really meeting people as individuals that will make us realize we have a whole lot more in common than we have differences."

And this coming school year, as in all the previous, Brown will mix her visually disabled students into the community as much as possible, in the hope that community members will learn to meet them as individuals.

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