Chandra Learning and Public Outreach

FROM EARTH TO THE SOLAR SYSTEM OVERVIEW

The From Earth to the Solar System (FETTSS) project exhibits images from across the Solar System in public venues such as parks, libraries and other free, community-based public science locations to provide multi-generational and family-friendly content in English and Spanish. The purpose of the program is to communicate crosscutting NASA content (in heliophysics, planetary science and multiwavelength astrophysics) with casual and/or non-intentional audiences—members of the public who may not already be heavily invested in science. The program utilizes an online repository built at no-cost that encourages replication of exhibits suitable for local adaptation around the world, as well as a NASA-funded traveling exhibit visiting over a dozen US locations from 2011-2012.

A CASE STUDY FOR PUBLIC SCIENCE EVENTS

From Earth to the Solar System (FETTSS) was conceived as a direct response for NASA's Year of the Solar System (which ran for one Martian year, from October 2010 through August 2012), and provides a solid case study for the category of public science events.

As with its predecessor project, From Earth to the Universe (FETTU), the FETTSS organizational structure follows a grass-roots approach (Russo & Christensen, 2010) in which local organizers are provided with high-quality, accurate materials to print their own version of the exhibition for their selected venues. The FETTSS project supplies high-resolution electronic files that have been approved for non-commercial outreach use to be displayed in any way that makes sense for a given venue, with the printing, installation, and other logistics are the responsibility of the local hosts.

Such global-to-local methodologies in distributed curation offer exponential increases in exposure and impact from an original single-noded project, expanding access beyond the cost of the original EPOESS-funded US program into an international public science program.

The existing international FETTU network was leveraged to advertise the FETTSS opportunity beyond NASA and U.S.-specific audiences. As of March 2013, over 100 venues from around the world have hosted FETTSS events, from cafés in New Zealand to a mall in Texas.

View the published papers on FETTSS and public science results.

WHAT DID PARTICIPANTS LEARN

Venus rotates opposite Earth's rotation.
That not all stars go from a Red Giant to a Blue Giant.
About the existence of water on other planets that although frozen this increased my thinking that life man exist not only on Earth.
That the rings of Saturn resulted from a collision with a moon.
About Uranus. I did not know it rotated sideways.
The size of the spot on Jupiter is the size of the Earth.

At first I didn't know the organisms that lived in Yellowstone. I feel like checking it out on the internet.
I enjoyed learning about the various conditions on the planets. I found the Geminid meteor mystery really interesting.
Study of lakes helps scientists to learn more about climate change's impact on environment.
How we study place on Earth to learn more about space (Andes Mts.)
Europa – the distinct lines and massive tides are interesting.

HOW DID PARTICIPANTS LIKE THEIR FETTSS EXPERIENCE

PARTICIPANTS REACTIONS TO MEMORABLE FETTSS IMAGES

Demographic and location results from six evaluated FETTSS sites. Participant makeup suggests a higher proportion of females, and younger average ages, than is often typically found in demographics of, for example, high-energy astrophysics public web site visitors and their connected social media outlets.

METRICS

Sites	Reference	Locale	No. of Surveys	Males	Females	Average Age
Corpus Christi U. Texas*	CC	Shopping Mall	50	25	25	34
National Air and Space Museum	NASM	Outside	52	29	23	42
Central Florida U.	CFU	University Library	33	18	15	28
Union Station Kansas City	KC	Outside the Planetarium	14	7	7	33
Penn State, PA*	PS	Off-Campus Art Gallery	48	20	28	47
University of Puerto Rico*	PR	Community Library	49	28	21	25
Total			246	127	119	35

(*) Denotes partnering institution, however, exhibits were conducted off-site.

This chart provides an overview of the levels of education (in percentages) from each of the sites. A clear majority of visitors were working on a college degree or had attained an advanced degree.

Sites	Some HS	HS Grad	Some College	College Grad.	Some grad. school	Masters	Prof. Degree
CC	10	18	32	14	14	8	4
NASM	6	8	27	17	12	19	12
CFU	3	3	48	15	12	6	12
KC	0	14	36	21	7	14	7
PS	0	4	6	31	8	25	25
PR	6	14	51	14	0	8	6

Average responses from combined sites are based on a 1 – 5 scale

Overall, how do you feel about From Earth to the Solar System?
Disliked/Liked	4.6
Learned Nothing/Learned a lot	4.2
Boring/Fascinating	4.2

To what extent has seeing From Earth to the Solar System increased or decreased your interest in the following?
Astronomy	3.9
Attending another science event	3.9
Reading about science on-line	3.8

This table shows a sampling of responses to this open-ended question. The science-based responses indicate that the visitor had gained specific information. The art-based responses made strong visual connections. In both categories there was a degree of excitement implied with the use of vocabulary and exclamation points.

Which particular image or images stand(s) out in your mind? Please Explain.
Science	Art
Milky Way. Within the huge Milky Way, Earth is there.	"Space Weather"—Awesome to see such solar detail. Our "Milky Way", great to see tiny details.
Our moon is a tool of study	The sun's weather—a vision of the sun unlike anything I've ever seen or thought of before.
Iapetus. I want to know exactly how it got so dirty.	Infrared and planet surfaces are awesome
The sunspots because I am fascinated by them! Extreme Yellowstone and the stromatolites—they are geology—related which is part of my degree.	Milky Way images are awe-inspiring. Laguna Verde—beautiful to see pictures of earth with analogs in space.
The Andes volcanic lakes—would be cool to be a scientist there. Wonder how they got up there.	The Aurora Borealis stood out the most. It is so beautiful and something I will have a chance to experience in May.
Saturn's rings because I had no idea how small they were and how they may have been formed from a moon crashing into the planet.	Mars Victoria crater. Reminded me of the human eye—stunning!
Frozen Moon because of the ice. There could possibly be ice.	The great storm on Jupiter is so mysterious.
Solar climate; It looks interesting. I did not know what it was. Learned there are storms on a star.	The up-close image of the surface of Europa. The geometry of the lines doesn't look natural and I love how abstract the image is.
The image of Europa. I did not know ice existed on other parts of the solar system.	Centaurus A. It looks like a painting done by hand. It is beautiful.

A total of 64% of those surveyed responded to this open-ended question compiled from all the sites. Of those who answered, 76% reported a factual piece of information.

What is something you have learned or learned more about from FETTSS? Factual Responses
Venus rotates opposite Earth's rotation.
I learned that Huygens had returned surface photos of Titan
Stromatolites!
Titan's surface (very cool!)
That not all stars go from a Red Giant to a Blue Giant
About the existence of water on other planets that although frozen this increased my thinking that life man exist not only on Earth.
That the rings of Saturn resulted from a collision with a moon.
About Uranus. I did not know it rotated sideways.
The size of the spot on Jupiter is the size of the Earth.
At first I didn't know the organisms that lived in Yellowstone. I feel like checking it out on the internet.
I enjoyed learning about the various conditions on the planets. I found the Geminid meteor mystery really interesting.
Study of lakes helps scientists to learn more about climate change's impact on environment.
How we study place on Earth to learn more about space (Andes Mts.)
Europa—the distinct lines and massive tides are interesting.
There might be life on moons – arsenic based life is possible.

General comments by number. Most visitors were positive about the exhibit.

General comments compiled across sites in actual numbers
Positive	76
Negative	4
Suggestions	7
Total	87

General comments were overwhelmingly positive. People were enthusiastic about the exhibit. The few negative comments mentioned a desire for more interactivity and issues with the label copy. There were a variety of suggestions.

General Comments Across Sites
Positive	Negative	Suggestions
Very exciting and informative. My 7yr. old liked it very much. I will look up info for him.	While interesting, I would prefer more artistic exhibits (vs. science) in this space. (from PS)	Bring more photos, more variety.
Beautifully done. Am coming back.	The pictures are cool but the labels are not very stimulating or interesting,	Would like to see relative size of moons next to each planet they circle.
Incredible photo, (Victoria Crater), looking straight down on the crater. Wonderful color, imagery.	Interesting, but I am not sure I retained a large proportion of all the info I read.	I would like to have seen some models of the space probes. Also, an interactive exhibit would be a better learning experience.
Very interested in astronomy now.	Explanations were slightly hard to understand.	Wish there was more than just pictures. Go Science!
Kepler project is surprising. Will follow that one.		It would be great to have a scale of some sort with the images to show where you are out from the sun.
Eye-catching!
I am an astronomy graduate student so most of the information is review but still great to see alongside beautiful images.
I enjoyed the fact that it was a blend of science and art.