Alissa Kuseske has always been crazy about space. When she screamed in the board room in front of NASA headquarters representatives, they probably thought she was crazy. That was when she learned that NASA would take her for a ride. Experiencing weightlessness on NASA’s KC-135 – also known as the Weightless Wonder and the “Vomit Comet” – was a dream come true for Alissa Kuseske and a great learning experience for her sixth-grade students. “It’s an experience I’ll never be able to parallel,” she said. Kuseske went on the Weightless Wonder to complete an experiment for her class. She is a 1993 graduate of Kimball Area High School and a sixth-grade teacher at Crossroads Elementary Science Magnet Montessori in St. Paul. Crossroads Elementary is in the NASA Explorer School program. NASA provides professional development to teachers; grant funds to support technology; and equipment for science, math and technology in classrooms; and access to NASA’s numerous curriculum materials. When Kuseske found out that three of the 50 schools in the program would be invited to test their experiment in the Weightless Wonder she couldn’t wait to get started, and neither could her students. “We wanted to do something that nobody else had done,” Kuseske said. The students thought of the final experiment themselves. They decided to study rotational motion and test spinning tops. Students collected 28 tops. Tops were store-bought, home-made, or items found around the house, like a CD or a football. First, the students did a ground test. They wrote a hypothesis about how each top would spin on earth, which is 1 gravity (g.) versus in 0 g., which is about 1/6 the gravity felt on earth. When the kids couldn’t agree, they wrote multiple hypotheses. Then they tested the tops and recorded the information. After a lengthy application process, their experiment was accepted in NASA’s Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunities Program. Kuseske and the school’s science curriculum coordinator, Bill Lindquist, headed to Houston April 14, toting 23 spinning tops. The elementary school representatives were teamed up with scientists and underwent three days of training togetherwith college groups that were also invited to fly on the KC-135. The college students’ experiments often came from their professors or their departments. They were impressed that the Crossroads Elementary sixth-graders thought of their experiment themselves. At last, it was time to fly. The KC-135 would fly 30-40 parabolic arches, and during each arch there would be 20-25 seconds of weightlessness. When the plane flies parabolic arches the nose is pointed upward at a 45-degree angle as the plane climbs to 4,500 feet. Then, the engines are shut off and the nose falls until it’s at a 45-degree angle pointing downward. At the same time, the plane falls from about 4,500 feet to 2,000 feet. During the fall, passengers experience weightlessness for 20-25 seconds. The climb and fall are repeated numerous times over the Gulf of Mexico. Kuseske received a lot of advice from astronauts. The most important advice they offered was to take a few moments to make a memory of the feeling of weightlessness. Kuseske was more than ready when she boarded the KC-135. She calmly laid down on the floor of the plane and held onto a rope as they climbed. During the climb the pull of gravity went from 1 g. to almost 1.8 g. The additional force of gravity pulled her to the floor. “You feel like you weigh a lot,” Kuseske said. “I tried to lift my arm and it fell because it was so heavy.” Someone on the crew said, “You’re about to experience weightlessness.” As the plane reached the top of the arch and the engine was about to be turned off, the pilot yelled, “Over the top.” “My whole body lifted up,” Kuseske said. “[I thought] is the ceiling moving, or am I?” Then, the flood lights were turned on inside the cabin. “Everything was so clear and bright. It was an unbelievable feeling.” On the second parabola Kuseske let go of the rope. “I just floated and closed my eyes to make that memory,” she said. After that, Kuseske did the experiment during weightlessness. She was strapped to the floor and spun the tops in a mounted, titanium glove box to contain them. During the 10 parabolas she only tested a few tops when one of the engines caught on fire and they had to turn back. Mr. Lindquist was able to do more of the tests and between the two of them they tested about half the tops in 0 g. Kuseske is one of the few non-astronauts who has experienced weightlessness, and there are currently only 152 astronauts Now, it is important to share her experience, she said. One important thing that Kuseske shared with her students is that not everyone who works at NASA is an astronaut. “There are so many people behind the scenes making things go,” she said. “There are researchers, mechanics and different scientists. It opened my eyes to brand new things for my students.” Kuseske’s students are still analyzing data from the trip and comparing it to the ground data. They hope to complete the final report by the end of the school year. The report has to be turned in to NASA and the NASA Explorer Schools program. It will also be published in Science and Children. The process of doing year-long experiment-from brainstorming ideas to writing a conclusion-taught the students a lot. “They learned that science takes a long time and it’s an ongoing thing,” Kuseske said. Her class will continue to benefit from their partnership with NASA for the next two years. Last week, Kuseske and two student representatives went, along with representatives from all 50 NASA Explorer Schools, to Kennedy Space Center. NASA provided pretty much everything, from airfare to admission to visit Epcot Center. This is just one of the benefits of the program. All of her students have received folders, pencils, bumper stickers and posters. Just a small treat compared to the technology equipment NASA gives each school. “They [NASA] want people to understand that everyone’s mission is different,” Kuseske said. “Everybody doesn’t have to love math, love science, love writing or love reading. But, everyone has to understand all those things.” Each school is partnered with a scientist and a NASA research center. Crossroads Elementary works with Nancy Hall at with the Glenn Research Center, located in Cleveland. There are currently three schools in Minnesota in the NASA Explorer School program that also work with the Glenn Research Center. Additional schools from across the nation will be added next year. This is the first year of the program and more than 3,000 schools applied to participate. Crossroads Elementary is one of 50 schools chosen for the program. Kuseske wrote the grant to apply for the program. “It was the first grant I ever wrote,” Kuseske said. “I wrote it [with the help] off of Google.” Kuseske will share her experience in some Kimball Elementary classrooms in the coming weeks.
