An elementary school in Canarsie is using NASA astronauts as teachers and earning money in the process.
It’s with a new video conferencing system that P.S. 115, the Daniel Mucatel School, can link students to astronauts who led a math and science lesson last week.
For this visionary and creative way to educate students, the school just won an Imagination Award from the Lincoln Center Institute for the Arts in Education and a $5,000 grant to support technological advances.
“We will use it to help develop or supplement the equipment that we have in place,” explained Mitchell S. Pinsky, principal of the school, which is located at East 92nd Street and Avenue M.
“We’ve brought in video conferencing within the past three weeks and have done some trial runs with that with NASA and the Smithsonian Institution,” he said.
Children are enthralled by the high-tech instruction.
“So far we’ve had two third grade classes take part in these trial runs. It was amazing. The response was amazing,” Pinsky said. “As technologically orientated as the kids are, this type of technology is not something that most of the kids have been exposed to.”
The students’ enthusiasm for inventive teaching methods is rubbing off on educators.
“Some of my staff members are probably more excited than the kids because we understand the potential of something like this,” he continued.
There’s an extra bonus for the school by using video conferencing equipment – they get high-quality instruction without having to hire additional teachers. This is especially beneficial since public schools will undergo another round of budget cuts this September.
“It’s helpful in terms of not having to pay for a teacher,” Pinsky said.
But most importantly, he continued, “How often are you able to get an astronaut to teach a math lesson?”
