Public Observatory Project - Transition Phase

ast -1219836该奖项为国家航空航天博物馆（NASM）的公共天文台在最初的两年建设、开放和初始运营期间继续运营提供了关键支持，并保持它的可行性，直到它能成为国家广场上一个永久性的教育和公众宣传功能。游客通过一个完全专业的望远镜和一系列较小的专业太阳望远镜观看，并通过天文台、邻近天文台和博物馆本身的活动项目来增强和深化他们的体验。NASM的工作人员已经成功地测试了将天文馆、天文台、画廊之旅和探索站结合起来的项目，这些项目得到了几个来源的支持，包括以前的NSF奖。这使得天文台成为一个重要的资本运动的一部分，以确保它的寿命。目前的桥梁奖将支持天文台白天和晚上的节目，增加公众每天的非正式访问。它还将为科学、数学、工程和技术（SMET）本科学生提供一个有效的培训基地，让他们充当导师和向导，学习如何交流他们对科学的兴奋之情。国家广场上的SMET设施的高度积极可见性清楚地表明，天文学是我们文化的一部分，公共天文台是史密森尼提高国家科学素养目标的物理化身。天文台还使人们看到了国家天文台系统，象征着该系统的择优哲学。在最初的两年里，训练有素的天文学教育工作者、实习生、有偿的学生解说员和一大批志愿者，让数以万计的人通过望远镜进行了10万多次观测，他们来自各种各样的人群，从普通游客到专业天文学家，从当地家庭到外国游客，再到学校和日间营地团体。

AST-1219836This award provides critical support to continue operating the Public Observatory at the National Air and Space Museum (NASM) beyond the initial two-year period of construction, opening, and initial operation, and to keep it viable until it can become a permanent fully endowed education and public outreach feature on the National Mall.Visitors look through a fully professional telescope and an array of smaller specialized solar telescopes and have their experience enhanced and deepened by activity-based programming included in the observatory, adjacent to it, and in the Museum proper. NASM staff have successfully tested programs that synergistically combine the planetarium, the observatory, gallery tours and discovery stations, using support from several sources, including previous NSF awards. This has led to the Observatory becoming part of a major capital campaign to ensure its longevity. The present bridge award will support daytime and evening programming at the Observatory, increasing daily informal access by the public. It will also provide an effective training ground for undergraduate science, mathematics, engineering and technology (SMET) students to act as mentors and guides, learning to communicate the excitement of their science.The heightened positive visibility of an SMET facility on the National Mall makes the clear intellectual statement that astronomy is part of our culture, and the Public Observatory is a physical personification of the Smithsonian's goal to improve science literacy in the Nation. The Observatory also makes visible the national observatory system, and symbolizes the merit-based philosophy of that system. In these first two years, trained astronomy educators, interns, paid student Explainers and a host of volunteers enabled over 100,000 looks through telescopes by tens of thousands of people, in all categories imaginable from casual tourists to professional astronomers to local families to foreign travelers, to school and day camp groups.