Riverwoods Field Lab Has Already Begun Celebrating the 2009 IYA!
by Christopher Stephan, Education Specialist, Riverwoods Field Lab
Cornwell, Florida: Riverwoods Field Laboratory, part of Florida Atlantic University’s Center for Environmental Studies has already begun celebrating the 2009 IYA! Riverwoods is a comprehensive Education and Research Center focused on environmental science and education. Our Education Program hosts secondary students and community groups for either one day or overnight workshops. Since we are located on the Kissimmee River in rural Highlands County, Florida, our night skies are very dark. We have developed a new Astronomy Program with lessons that include fun facts and field activities to view the moon, stars and constellations for students and adults. Programs this fall included Explore Your Night Sky on November 7, 2008 that hosted 57 residents who enjoyed the Night Sky PowerPoint presentation developed by Chris Stephan, our Education Specialist. We set up 6 telescopes to view the night sky, and had several local amateur astronomers that brought telescopes to assist.
Our overnight Student Field Studies Program has introduced the IYA to 9 classes from July – December 2008. Classes include Upward Bound minority students from Miami, Palm Beach Community College Environmental Science students, Lake Placid’s Future Farmers of America (FFA) students, Forest Hill Environmental Academy from West Palm Beach, and 5 classes from South Plantation High School’s Everglades Academy in Broward County. All these students live in urban areas impacted by light pollution. Many students and teachers commented about the darkness and beauty of our night sky and were amazed at the diversity of celestial observations seen in the telescopes. We are located in a very small town of Cornwell over 25 miles from the nearest towns of Sebring or Okeechobee. Our skies are extremely clear, and on a steady night one can see 6.5 magnitude with the naked eye.
These photos illustrate students from South Plantation High School looking through the telescopes at Riverwoods. You can see the excitement on their faces! Most have never looked through a telescope before, or seen such beautiful dark skies. Although we are only 2 hours from metropolitan areas (Tampa, West Palm, and Orlando) we have the perfect venue for celestial observations as our skies remain clear and dark.
The 2009 IYA will be very busy at Riverwoods as we already have 14 Explore Your Night Sky Programs scheduled from January – May 2009. On Jan. 23rd, we will host the general public at our nearby site, the DuPuis Management Area. Student Field Study classes include the University of London, England graduate students that have been coming to Riverwoods for the past 10 years. Other classes include Palm Beach Atlantic College, Broward Community College, Suncoast High School and more South Plantation students (we host all 250 of their 10 graders!)
When the skies are cloudy, we work inside with PowerPoint presentations, celestial globe activities to identify the constellations, and spectroscopes to observe the light spectrums that simulate stars.
This is a new venture for Riverwoods Field Lab. Our Director, Loisa Kerwin feels that the Explore Your Night Sky Program is an excellent complement to our Field Studies conducted on the Kissimmee River. We are excited to help celebrate the 2009 International Year of Astronomy and share the passion for learning about our Night Skies. For more information, contact Loisa at lkerwin@strato.net or call 863/462-0025.
Image Caption: Chris Stephan points toward Venus and Jupiter to show these South Plantation High School students what we are looking at in our 10 inch dobsonian reflecting telescope.
