GPM Mentorship Program - Educator Track

Versione Italiana

Overview

The GPM Mentorship Program – Educator Track is engaging with teachers and educators from kindergarten to high-school, providing them with resources to teach their students about the GPM mission, Earth’s water cycle, weather and climate, and other related topics. To aid this, the GPM Outreach Team has developed a variety of educational resources in multiple languages. 

NASA researcher and GPM Mentor Lisa Milani working with Italian students as part of the GPM Mentorship Program - Educator Track. Credits: Lisa Milani

Program Details

In 2023 NASA’s Global Precipitation Measurement Mission (GPM) Mentorship Program hosted a spin-off program dedicated to teachers and educators. This pilot effort connected a GPM expert with Italian middle- and high-school teachers to teach them about the water cycle, atmospheric observables, and precipitation through the lens of the GPM mission.

Given the success of the first year, for the 2023-2024 school year the program has been extended to every grade,from kindergarten to high school, involving students from 5 to 18 years old. The focus of the project is to provide knowledge and tools to teachers so they can share GPM-related resources and scientific information with their students. After three lectures, the teachers aided by the GPM expert will develop a multidisciplinary project with the students focused on precipitation. Classroom activities and discussions will help approaching precipitation observations from a multidisciplinary perspective, involving math, physics, computer resources and language (improve English as a second language).

The program is in constant development and is looking to expand into other countries, including Portugal and Türkiye, to develop educational material in different languages. The goal is to reduce language barriers and make Earth observation data more accessible for students around the world.