Space for all: a multinational study on the status of astronomy education

ABSTRACT

Existing research in astronomy education is largely centred on undergraduates. We conducted this qualitative study to explore examples of astronomy education internationally, providing context to the quantitative study by Salimpour et al. (2021). Our methods included an online survey (N = 68) and 10 interviews with select participants to discover the methods of learning and teaching astronomy in K12. We used thematic analysis to contrast international astronomy education efforts in formal and informal education settings. Interview participants provided examples of programmes that disrupt representation gaps in astronomy fields and promote STEM connections amongst historically underserved populations. The present study will inform future studies and collaborations between educators, astronomers, and informal spaces, and provide examples of astronomy integrations in coursework and community. This, along with the ongoing work of Salimpour and Fitzgerald, can provide multinational curricular and pedagogical examples of leveraging astronomy as a ‘gateway science’ and inform interdisciplinary/transdisciplinary approaches to teaching science.

KEYWORDS:

• Astronomy education
• international education
• STEM/STEAM

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics statement

This study was carried out under the education research programme at University of California, Santa Barbara (IRB# 61-22-0025). All procedures performed in this study were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. Informed consent was obtained from all survey and interview participants involved in this study. This research was not supported by grant funding from any entity or institution. The first author holds a similar role to some participants as the national chair of an international committee on astronomy education.

Notes

1 Forty-four states have adopted frameworks based upon NGSS. States such as California have even renamed physics courses to ‘physics in the Universe,’ which includes robust astronomy sequences.

2 Grow Beyond Earth; Space Chili Grow a Pepper Challenge; Tomatosphere (available in the US and Canada).

3 NASA Microobservatory; Stellarium; WorldWideTelescope; SLOOH is low cost

4 NASA Asteroid Data Hunter (Topcoder); NASA FITS Image Viewer; American Association of Variable Star Observers; Solar and Heliophysics Observatory (SOHO).