FAIRMONT, W.Va. — Officials at The Katherine Johnson NASA IV&V Education Resource Center in Fairmont are taking a different approach towards a yearly tradition involving West Virginia students.
In response to the COVID-19 Pandemic, researchers with NASA’s Independent Verification and Validation Program (IV&V) are finding a way to continue Kids Day in the Park. A yearly tradition where normally West Virginia students would visit the I-79 Technology Park Research Center in Fairmont for two days. In response to COVID-19 safety protocols, officials moved the two day event, to a week long virtual event where students can listen to several researchers hold learning sessions about various researched topics.
“We’ll have a direct link to our website through the NASA IV&V Education Resource Center Facebook page,” explained NASA IV&V Program Education specialist Josh Revels. “And once you are on the Day in the Park Website either through using the URL or finding us on Facebook, all that you have to do is locate the sessions,” he said.
Over the course of the week students will be introduced to various topics that are researched at the Katherine Johnson NASA IV&V. Not only will outer space and aeronautics be expected to be discussed, other advanced sciences that are researched by some of West Virginia’s top minds will be available for West Virginia students to learn in a virtual format. This will also include topics outerwordly and wordly that affect NASA operations.
“So at the sessions we have STEM professionals, who will be giving a talk on science, technology, engineering or math content, and relating that content to a career that they do here in the West Virginia region,” he said.
Normally a day involving middle school students from across West Virginia, Day in the Park will now be open to any West Virginia student wishing to learn more about various topics researched at the I-79 Technology Park Research Center. The goal according to Revels is to increase awareness of their efforts to older students. With older eyes potentially seeing advanced space, computer science and other research in action, there’s an increased chance of seeing them work in the field in the future.
“These activities and topics are really useful for everybody that would be interested,” said Revels. “And so yeah, I can see high school students potentially becoming interns,” he said.
According to Revels, they have seen a positive response when it comes to the virtual sessions they have been presenting involving Day in the Park. While it is expected to go all week, over five hundred different links for students across the state were a part of activities Wednesday and is expected to grow by the time Day in the Park ends on Friday. For those who are presenting from The Katherine Johnson NASA IV&V Education Resource Center, the more the merrier.
“We had 520 viewers during the event, which is a significant expansion on the impact we would make at these in person events, so we’re expecting even more people to join in on Wednesday,” he said.