The Future

Wow! They say time flies when you're having fun and time has certainly flown since the Challenger Learning Center of Kentucky opened for business approximately 800 missions and 24,000 students ago.

The Challenger Learning Center of Kentucky is not just simulated space missions! Because of an excellent Challenger Center staff and a progressive board of directors, we have implemented and will continue to pursue many new programs that will build upon our ability to provide science, math, and technology enrichment opportunities for our students, teachers, and parents. Already, we have become a resource for teachers. Approximately 200 teachers have participated in our "Mission Prep" training for teachers bringing their students for a mission simulation. Our staff has gone out to various schools to judge science fairs, put on astronomy demonstrations, and to speak at career day events. "Reach for the Stars" and "Operation Imagination" have been two, weeklong teacher trainings in which approximately 50 teachers have been trained in astronomy, navigation using GPS, weather, soil and water testing, and the use of simulations in the classroom.

What does our future hold? Well, of course the Challenger Learning Center of Kentucky has moved to the new Clemons Center on the Hazard Community College Campus which will also house the new Interactive Science Center. This new science center will have interactive displays that will teach science concepts in a fun, challenging, hands-on method to students of all ages. We will be starting a teacher resource center where teachers will be able to find and borrow creative resources to transform their classroom into a futuristic learning lab. We are currently working on a program called PACCT (Parents and Children As Co-Travelers) that will have parents and students working together as partners in science experiments and simulated space missions. We plan on developing a "Red Rover" program where we will build a Mars Rover, which can be programmed by students to travel over a simulated Mars landscape, just like the real rover "Sojourner", that scientists sent to Mars.

Doesn't all of this sound interesting and exciting? Please come along with us on our mission to bring a world of exploration, and discovery to the classrooms of Eastern and Central Kentucky. We've had a great beginning but we've only just begun!

Thomas L. Cravens