Science File Dr. Roche, please can you describe your new role as "space ambassador"?
Dr. Roche Basically, my role in Wales (there are a number of other SA’s, covering Scotland, NI and 4 regions of England) is to use space and astronomy to develop the STEM education agenda, and raise awareness of the UK and ESA’s role in the space industry.
SF Can you talk a little about your background in science communication?
DR I started off as a PhD student, helping out with some adult education courses and visiting local schools who had asked for science talks, so I was giving talks and working with schoolchildren and adults. This developed into a more active role, offering talks and workshops to schools, and then obtaining funding from what was then PPARC (now STFC), who offered grants for outreach work.
I discovered a project called “Telescopes in Education”, operating a 24-inch telescope in California over a dial-in modem, and starting taking this around schools in the SE of England (when I was based in Sussex as a lecturer).
I always enjoyed teaching, and soon realised that whilst my research was only ever going to be “average”, my teaching was very good. Eventually I got the new job of head of education at the National Space Centre in Leicester, and from there I started advising, and eventually running, the Faulkes Telescope Project. Since 2000, I have had continuous funding from PPARC and then STFC to be the “UK National Schools’ Astronomer”, which has allowed me to work all over the country, giving public talks, training teachers and running schools’ workshops.
SF Do you have any specific plans for the job which you would like to talk about?
DR I am a big supporter of teacher training, so I intend to focus a lot of effort on targeting STEM teachers to show them the opportunities available through using space as a hook to engage children of all ages.
SF Is this the first time in the UK that such an "ambassador" has been appointed, and if so why now?
DR There are 7 SA’s in total, funded by a combination of money from the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Dept. for Education. Now that the UK has a Space Agency (March 2010), it was felt that it was time to try and adopt the ESA “ESERO” (ESA Space Education and Resource Office) model, and actively promote space. That was coupled with a growing realisation that more children need to be studying science and maths and working in the space industry. A lot of people don't even realise that Britain has a space industry, and are shocked when you tell them that it generates 6.5 billion pounds for the economy annually, and employs some 68,000 people. We want to encourage people to think about going into careers which have something to do with the space industry.
SF Do you think that communicating astronomy to youngsters is different from communicating other sciences to them?
Astronomy has some advantages in that it is a highly visual subject, with beautiful images from things like the Hubble Space Telescope, and also it covers some of the most fascinating subjects – astronauts, the Big Bang, black holes, alien life etc. So it has the benefits of being a subject that many/most people have at least some interest in (even if much of it is from the TV and movies!), and also being one that can be appreciated for its aesthetic appeal – lots of pretty pictures! As an astronomer I am fully aware that astronomy is not a huge part of the national curriculum in any of the countries of the UK, so what we try and do is to use astronomy and space as a "hook" , using the exciting, visual bits of astronomy as a way of trying to get children involved in all sorts of science, whether it's biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, design technologies...all these sorts of areas, but we use astronomy and space science as a way of putting the curriculum material in context.
I´m a big fan of the idea that you just don´t just teach people facts and figures and expect them to remember them: you teach them why this stuff is important and how it´s relevant to them. And if people can see a relevance to the science you are trying to teach them, they are much more likely to want to learn about it and understand it rather than just saying right, learn this because there's an exam in it.
"I think it is vital to show people the relevance of science to them, so that they can appreciate that even “blue skies” research may eventually have all sorts of unpredicted benefits."
SF What can be done to interest youngsters in science and maths generally, when science is not seen as "cool"?
I hope that through my SA role I can help to show that science is not only “cool” but also a fundamental part of much of everyday life now – most people have little or no appreciation of how reliant they are on technology, and how much of that technology derives from or is supported by the space industry and associated research. I think it is vital to show people the relevance of science to them, so that they can appreciate that even “blue skies” research may eventually have all sorts of unpredicted benefits.
SF Is the study of astronomy perhaps the best way to get children involved with science generally, as against other sciences such as physics or chemistry?
As I mentioned previously, I think astronomy is a good vehicle for STEM education, as it can cover a wide range of subjects in an exciting and visually appealing way. Physics and chemistry have always been a huge part of astronomy, but the newer science of astrobiology means that we can now cover all 3 basic sciences within astronomy, and hopefully make them a little more appealing and interesting. We also work with the space industry side of things: there are materials sciences and engineering and all sorts of other areas, so we can use astronomy and space as a sort of "umbrella" under which we can teach all these subjects.
The children aren't necessarily interested in these subjects - there´s always been an image problem with science in schools - but I think we can make science more interesting, more exciting, more engaging by using, for example, dramatic pictures from the Hubble space telescope, astrononauts, all these sorts of things, and ask big questions such as where did the Universe come from, is there life elsewhere in the Universe, which children and adults alike always want to know whenever you talk to them.
SF I know from my own experience in schools that children do have an enthusiasm and curiosity for anything space-related...
DR Oh, absolutely. People are naturally curious - they want to know the answers to questions like what is the Universe expanding into, is there life in the solar system, what's happening on Mars, what was there before the Big Bang - all these classic questions which are difficult to answer but which you always get asked. And often it´s not the most gifted children in the class, the ones who are not interested in science at all, who you can engage with when you talk about black holes and aliens and this sort of stuff. Astronomy is a way in, it's a way of getting through to these children to get them interested in these subjects. It's an extremely visual subject which can appeal to children who are not necessarily into the maths and physics of things.
But at the same time I am aware that we are not going to change a whole generation´s attitude to science just by talking to them. So what we do as space ambassadors is to show people that space has a relevance to them, that a lot of their technology, their mobile phones, their GPS and so forth, relies on technology that was developed for the space industry...a lot of the things they do in their everyday lives relies on space technology. Also that we are not trying to turn them into engineers and space scientists: what we are trying to do is to build an appreciation for what space science actually does - what astronomers do, what scientists in general do - and just to let people realise that space doesn't cost them money, it actually makes an enormous amount of money for our economy, so while they might ask why we are spending 500 million pounds a year on STFC, the space industry actually generates 6.5.billion pounds a year. It's a massive gain to the economy, an investment in terms of the amount that the taxpayer spends.
"You put an astronaut in a school and every kid loves space for a day or so."
SF As regards the Ambassador programme, other countries have had great success with similar projects - NASA's Solar System Ambassadors, for example...
DR Indeed. What America has which we don't really have is astronauts - they are incredible ambassadors, people who have actually been into space. Every state has a handful of people who have lived there and who have been into space, and they can wheel those out to schools, and they are amazingly inspirational people. But in the UK, and ESA in general, the problem we have is that there are a few astronauts within ESA, and an even smaller number who are originally from the UK, and it's very hard to get those role models out. You put an astronaut in a school and every kid loves space for a day or so. The difficulty is to make it more widespread, more long-term so that it's not just a one-hit thing, a one-day event, it's a long-term sustained thing. And then you've got to say to children look, if you want to be an astronaut, you've either got to be a top gun fighter pilot or a scientist - those are the only people who get to go into space (unless of course you're a multi-millionaire with enough money to spend on a space holiday). But apart from that, it's scientists and engineers who get to go into space most often...it kind of opens people´s eyes to what´s going on out there and how much money it's actually worth to the country....and there are jobs there, there are careers in the space industry: not so much as astronauts, but in all the associated technology- and science-based programmes.
SF So what exactly will the funding allow you to do?
DR Effectively this is a small pot of money which I have to enable me to use a small amount of my time to facilitate meetings and events around Wales - my colleagues will be doing the same in their particular region - which includes things like running events in schools, organising teacher-training workshops, which is what I will be doing a fair bit of, networking events....it's trying to get scientists, industry and education people together, to talk about mutual benefits - what sort of things can we all do together that will benefit all of them. The people in industry complain that they aren't getting the number of graduates through the system that they want, universities are struggling to get people to sign up to undergraduate degree courses, and schools are saying that they are having problems getting people through to do 'A' Levels, so all the way down the line there is a sort of supply-and-demand issue.
I think one of the problems is that the kids we really need to be getting to are the 14- to 16-year-olds, the ones making GCSE and 'A' Level decisions, because it's at that age that we tend to lose the 'A' Level science track. You can lose them at 14, and if you do that then you very rarely get them back again. So we are really targeting the 14 to 16 age group, and hopefully that will then, long-term, feed through into more graduates going into the space industry.
SF And it´s good that this is finally being recognised, in the light of the current economic crisis, and that governments are starting to realise the economic benefits of the space industry......
DR Oh absolutely. I was just looking on the UK Space Agency Website, and there's a quote which says that the UK space sector is second only to the USA. We may not have our own astronauts, we may not launch our own rockets, but we build an awful lot of the infrastructure - the robotic systems, the communication systems, the engines, those sorts of things, which actually make other people´s space programmes work. So it´s a very big industry, and one which can develop a lot more in the future.
SF And Britain has, of course, a long history of world-beating engineering.....
DR Yes. But back in the seventies, a decision was made to basically cut the UK space programme. We were producing some of the most reliable rockets in the world - Black Knight, Black Arrow - but in the economic climate of the late seventies, it was a choice between investing in the UK space industry or investing in Concorde - and Concorde won, which effectively killed UK rocketry. It allowed the French to develop their Ariane launchers, which are now very reliable, very successful, but we could have been a world leader in this area. We are now second in the world, so we're not doing badly, but we could have been even better.
SF And lastly, Dr. Roche, what role do you think parents should play in the science education of their children, if any?
There are so many roles that parents can play, from actively supporting science education (e.g. taking children to museums and science centres, making sure they have books on the subject etc.) to the opposite extreme of simply not putting down an interest in science – children are very conscious of the “nerd/geek” image of science, and I think it is vital that parents don’t fall into reinforcing that stereotype, but actively support a healthy interest in science at all ages and abilities. Most people will not be scientists, but they will all use science and technology, and the more they realise this and appreciate those who work on it, the better.
SF Dr. Roche, thank you very much for your time and the very best of luck in your new position.
