To the moon and beyond.

And removing language barrier in our schools, in The Cities.

[lively music] [music ends] WQPT is bringing together educators and specialists for its annual multilingual education conference.

We'll take a closer look at what we'll learn.

But first, they're back home.

Last Friday, we saw the crew of Artemis II return to the Earth, completing a successful ten da trip around the moon and back.

But is this just the beginning?

NASA says yes.

We're joine by Augustana College Associate Professor of Physics, Docto William Petersen, whose research also includes studying radiation from Earth's magnetosphere and the high speed resolution radio imaging of the stars.

Three.

Two.

One.

[rocket blast] Booster ignition and liftoff!

The crew of Artemis II, now bound for the moon.

Humanity's next great voyage begins.

[cheering] Let's talk about this liftoff of Artemis and Artemis II.

How critically important, because you're sitting there going, well, it's always been Blue Origin, it's always Space X and now an amazing feat by NASA.

Well, I would argue that, NASA has been doing stuff this whole time.

I mean, we've had the International Space Station in orbit for 26 years, and, been doing lots of operations there, and they've had all the missions to Mars.

Right.

They've sent rovers and done wonderful science.

And... But what have you done for us today?

Well, yes.

In the public's eyes, as you well know, It is the first time that we've sent humans beyond low Earth orbit for 50 years.

Right?

So and that was a big part of the test was what wha effects to space have on people now that we have 50 years o advances in medical technology to see how weightlessness affects, you know, the immune system of the astronauts and just their their physica well-being and things like that.

But that also, I mean I want to go back to the Apollo missions, that, oh my gosh, we landed on the moon.

Then we did it again and we did it again.

And it got boring.

Oh my gosh, we have a space shuttle.

It went off and it got boring.

And no you have Artemis where we went.

Flybys of major planets.

We we're out of the, what is it?

The, I would say the galaxy, but we're out of the, What's Voyager out of?

Oh, well, we're out of the heliopause.

Heliopause, thank you.

but, I mean, our attention span seems to get very short in these things.

Do you think that the Artemis mission is re-energizing, the American public or even this new generation that didn't experience these things?

Yeah.

Well, certainly my students ar interested in what's going on.

When I talk to them about i in class, they want to know how they can get involved.

I mean, they, and, you know what's kind of interesting?

You were saying talking earlier about, you know, watching the Apollo missions, when you were a kid.

Right.

And when I grew up to, like, we wanted to be astronauts, right?

We saw this stuff, and we like, put on a space helmet.

We wanted to drink Tang.

We wanted to get out there.

Exactly right.

But, but my students see this, and they want, they want to be scientists.

You know, they see, like, a bigger picture.

And they're like, well, I want to do that, but they want to be, you know, me.

Maybe some of them want to be astronauts, but some of them want to, they're like, I want to build that rover right?

That's going to go into space.

Or, I want to look at that data that comes in and analyze what what we're learning.

Right.

Yeah.

So they're seeing the big picture and they're getting excited about it.

And so this mission happening you know it has a big impact.

It's directly impacting their future.

One of the areas that you you're specializing as you study the magnetosphere and the radiation belt.

Right?

I study specifically, magnetosphere of stars.

Okay.

All right.

So I look at, distant stars and use a lot of times, radio astronomy.

I use radio telescopes to map the magnetic fields of other stars so that we have something to compare to our own sun, because we know our own sun's magnetic field very well.

Exactly.

And so you're interpreting, millions of miles away.

So explain to m how you're getting your students interested in something that's that distant.

Well what I try to tell my students in astronomy class is that, we shouldn't think about space as just like, oh, it's really cool.

It's so cool to see pictures from space.

And, maybe someday we'll humans will go live on other planets or something like that.

We're embedded in space.

You know, space affects us here on Earth all the time.

So studying space is like studying the laboratory that is the universe.

Do you think, like Artemis mission, where it's on the other side of the moon and showing Earth as this little blue dot?

I mean, that has an impact.

I think, as well, like yo said, is the enormity of space and perhaps the insignificance although it's very significant to us of Earth.

Right?

I mean, both both things that you said are true.

It's, it's it's a small zone where we can actually live.

Right.

But the whole universe affects us on Earth, and everything that we do affects, you know, this place where we live.

When we talk about Artemis II, it's just the beginning.

Because you think of, three, 4 or 5 and, you know, we're going to supposedly the plan is to have man land on the moon again, well, within two years.

And also start, building on the moon, which really is amazing in order to go even further.

So tell me about how that is going to progress, rather quickly, for for man's exploration of space.

Yeah.

So they have they have had several plans, to go to the moon and they've kind of been adapting as things they have situations change.

Right.

So, Artemis III, the next mission, I believe, was going to be the first one where they landeded on the moon.

Yes.

where they landed on the moon.

Yes.

And but they've kind of adjusted plans.

Yes.

Okay.

Right.

Right, right, right.

So that this will actually be a test of the rendezvous of the Orion spacecraft with one of the what they called the, human landing systems.

So this would be like either, the one of the SpaceX rockets or Blue Origin or maybe both that will test rendezvous with that, rocket.

Because part of the difficulty when they go to the moon and try to land humans on the moon for the Artemis IV mission is getting from lunar orbi down to the surface of the moon.

Which we saw, of course, in the Apollo mission.

This is amazing, work.

But you hear sometimes peopl saying, we've done it already.

We've already gone to the moon.

Why are we doing this again?

So, part of what's different, I would say, in this era of space exploration is that, rather than kind of doing one off things where, you know, we built, we build a mission that goes to the moo and lands and great, we did it.

That's it.

They're doing a lot of kind of modular things with the space program now.

So like, the Orion capsule is designed to do not just go to the moon, but be reusable and do do lots of lots of missions.

And so to get to the moon, they have the the European service module.

I, I'm not sure if that's exactly the right name, but they attach that to the, the, Orion spacecraft to get it to the moon.

And then they, they are working on a human landing system and testing different system that would get the capsule down.

But, they can also use thes for other operations in space.

Right?

So rather than just kind of doing one off missions, we're sort of, almost, they're setting up kind of this ecosystem of reusable and sustainable, techniques and equipment that they can use to do exploration in space.

And as you said, there's a number of, missions that NASA is doing right now.

And and I was looking coming up this summer, the, Astrobotic Griffi one mission will deliver science and technology to the lunar south pole.

So, I mean, there's other things that are going on constantly that perhaps, once again, doesn't get the attention.

Right.

Yeah.

This is another modular thing where they're putting a couple of lunar rovers on the surface.

And so ones are really big, like 500 kilogram rover that will do tests and look for water and things like that.

And, but the other one is, called a cube rover.

So if you've heard of thes CubeSats, this is this program where different organizations, even schools can create this, these cube satellites, right, that, have a specific shape so they can easily b put into orbit and launched and, do science things.

So this is testing the same kind of idea with rovers.

Right.

So this cube rover will be like two of these little modular pieces that go together.

So.

And correct me if I'm wrong, the South Pole is important because that's where they hope to land.

That's where they hope to create, the space base.

The South Pole there they that that's one hope is to, create a permanent base on the moon.

But there's also, evidence of trac water under the lunar surface.

And so that's another goal of that mission, I believe, is to look for trace water elements.

As you pointed out.

I mean, for so many people, it is fun to watch, but it is also got a huge science component.

And there's always been this worry that Americans are falling behind when it comes to science education.

Do you think, as you said, that this is sparking something in students, not only the ones that you you have, but the future, like the kids that are in eighth grade that are that are going to go to college in like five, 5 or 10 years.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think so.

I think students see this and, you know, they see our dedication to exploration in science.

And I think that tells them that there there are opportunities if they go into, you know, I mean, it sparks imagination and it just, it it shows students that there are things that they can do if they want to go into this field.

And as you pointed out I mean, since, well, since the shuttles.

But man hasn't been in space for a while we haven't landed on the moon.

It ended, and it's been amazing.

Robots and rovers and space capsules that have gone past planets.

And they've given us pictures that wowed us, and also gave us scienc that we didn't even know about.

I think of the moons, around Saturn and Jupiter tha that we learned so much about.

But is it something different?

Is it something, that is almost beyond what we could expect, that we are going to be landing on the moon and the possibility within somebody's lifespan that we're going to be going to Mars?

Yeah.

I mean, it's I it's not something I thought would happen in my lifetime necessarily.

Is people going to Mars?

I, I think that, it is, that I think people ofte make the argument about manned exploration versus robots and I think there are advantages to both, right?

I mean, we... We we certainly have seen it.

...yeah, yeah.

I mean, we gain a lot of science, from sending robotic mission around, you know, they they're you can send robots places that people can't go.

When you want to send people to someplace like Mars, you need to do a lot of preparation to make sure they're safe, but also that they have everything they need to survive.

But we we learn so much when humans are directly at the locatio where they can do the science.

I mean, why else would we send people into, like, volcanoes or to the, to Antarctica to do science?

I mean, it helps to have people at the location.

The other thing that's different since the Apollo missions, too, is as you as you mentioned, there's there's a European contributions, as we saw, there's a Canadian flag next to the American flag.

Yeah.

I mean, NASA is really opened up in some ways, of course, to, private, companies getting involved, but also very much international.

Right, right.

I mean, with the International Space Station now.... Perfect example.

...is the first big collaboration.

Well, I don't kno about the first, but, it's it's good in a way that NASA, is not the sole, driver of a lot of this exploration, because if we want to kind of advance in terms of, exploring more, I thin everybody needs to be involved.

And that includes involving other countries it includes involving, private organizations as well.

And because, you know, that's sort of the people in a way.

Right?

And you bring up the ISS the International Space Station, which also is nearing the end of its life, the contributions of the ISS have have been amazing, have they not?

I mean... Oh, yeah.

...we're losin a little bit of science with its you know, it's destruction I guess, in, in, in the 2030s.

Right.

I mean, some potential perhaps but I think the reason they're, orbiting it is just, it' sort of a cost benefit analysis.

Exactly.

In order to bring it up to date and keep maintaining it, would be more costl than, what they're going to do, which is, that the idea is to maybe move, at least in low Earth orbit, to maybe a more commercially driven, scheme for having space stations.

So I think they're actually going to attach, a commercial module to the international Space Station, this axiom module, which is, by buil by a company in Texas, I think, before they de-orbit it.

So it's going to be one of the last modules attached.

And then the idea is that they will they're they're kind of testing it there, and then they'll detach it and use it to set up other stations in orbit.

So kind of the general idea, I think, is to kind of expand to a broader operations and low-Earth orbit in the same way that, you know, the idea is to build a base on the moon, right to, you know, continue all the science and exploration that we're doing.

Is it I mean, because you're in the middle of it, Augustana has got, the planetarium.

It's got great education for for kids.

Is it a fun time to be a scientist when it comes to, space exploration?

And as you said, I mean, even analysis of of incredibly faraway stars.

Yeah, you know, it it goes u and down, of course, over time.

But when you have a mission like this, that happens and gets everyone excited, it it does feel like, a pretty exciting time to be a scientist.

[triumphant music] [music peaks and trails off] So, Our thanks to Augustana College associate professor of physics Doctor William Petersen.

Once again, the John Deere Planetarium and the Gamble Observatory on the Augustana College campus are open to the public during special events.

Now, one future event is a planetarium and geology open house.

It's set for Saturday, April 25th at 8:30 p.m.

Find out more at the Augustana College website.

Just ahead a love for languages and learning.

But first, springtime events are popping up all over the Quad Cities, so here's some great ideas for you, your friends, and your family.

Thanks to visit Quad Cities.

Check out the things t do this week in the Quad Cities.

Start your week off by visiting Modern Woodman Park to watch the Quad Cities River Bandits play.

Then get ready for the region's largest spring networking event.

Enjoy booths, fun activities, Q food tastings and so much more.

Then enjoy a 90 minute concert performed by the Rock Orchestra at the Adler Theater.

Next, get ready because Food Truck Fridays are back.

Enjoy live music, shopping, and of course, food.

Finally, register for a class with QC Create and get ready to sip and paint at Jennies Boxcar.

For more events like these.

Check out our events calendar at VisitQuadCities.com.

WQPT is once agai offering educators, caregivers, and the community a chance to better understand the rich diversity of multilingual education for people of all ages, from the very young to adult.

The Multilingual Educatio Conference is set for Saturday, April 18th at the Western Illinoi University Quad Cities campus.

And WQPT Educational Outreach Director Melissa Gravert joins us to tell us what we can expect.

The multilingual education conference has been going on for a couple years, WQPT has been a part of.

I mean, why is it so successful?

Why is it so needed?

So, yes, the Multilingual Education conference has been an annual event here, at Western Illinois University for several years.

It's important because, it's a celebration of our multilingual students and their families and, especially their educators.

Right.

The teachers that work with them every day.

It's important because and it's successful because we know that, about 20 of K-12 public school students here in the Illinois Quad Cities are multilingual learners.

So they're learning in multiple languages at home and at school.

So, this conference serves, to meet the needs of those students and their teachers.

We also know how important reading is, particularly up to third grade.

I mean, we've heard it over and over again.

Is that that that third grade, level is so critically important for kids to be successful from that point forward.

Right.

Yes.

And so, the conference really is meant to support teachers from, preschoo all the way through adulthood, but yes, really, finding resources so that, students and then their families at home can support literacy, whether it's at that third grade level before or after.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Because it's important throughout... Yes.

...of course.

And you have some books her because we, we've got partners that are taking part in this that, that are trying to, hel further multilingual education.

Yes, yes.

So in particular, the Quad Cities United Way Women United is providing multilingual books.

You see a few examples here, for teachers to, take back to their classroom and share with their students.

Okay.

And so tell me a little bit about the the sessions that are going on.

And then I want to talk about the keynote speaker, but let' talk about the sessions.

Yeah.

So we have, about 15 different sessions that, attendees will be able to attend throughout the day.

Some of them, they'll make a choice.

So it's not, so collectively about five sessions, they'll attend throughout the day.

Some of those topics include, AI in schools.

Making connections between art and culture and language.

Writing, social studies, social emotional learning.

I'm checking my notes here because there's so many great ones.

The science of reading.

Providing books like these for multilingual students.

Helping educators use data to support equity, with their students and with other teachers.

We're also doing, a few special presentations.

We have, local educators from adult ESL programs that are coming to share.

We have local high school students, and local parents, that they themselves are multilingual learners coming to share about their experiences.

And your keynote speaker, an impressive person who is still working very hard in this area but has Western Illinois roots.

Yeah.

So Joanna Ponti of Jordan is our keynote speaker.

She graduated from, Western Illinois University in 20, oh, excuse me, 2007.

She received her teaching, certification as well as, a distinction of, the multilingual education program that Western has.

And so, yeah, she's went on to serve now as the executive director, of bilingual and multicultura services in the Rockford area.

So, yeah, we're so excited to have her join us and share her expertise.

One would wonder, why is WQPT involved in this?

And you're so active in the educational outreach in the community?

And you would say that this is one of the pillars of public broadcasting in the Quad Cities.

Right.

So part of our mission, of course, beyond providing resources as the public television in the Quad Cities.

We see educational outreach as really, such a key part of our mission.

And so this conference, supports that endeavor.

Again, it's an annual event.

Before it was a multilingual conference.

It was an early childhood conference for many years before that.

I remember that.

So, yeah, it's been a key par of our mission for many years.

And again, we see ourselves of course, as a public resource.

And we want to support all families and their needs and, support schools and teachers.

And who's attending this in particular?

Because it is for the educators.

But but more than that.

Right.

So really, anyone that's interested in learning more about multilingual education that wants to celebrat multilingual education with us, I mentioned how, yes, we'll have parents, students, WIU facult and of course, local educators.

But yeah, any community member that wants to come and learn more is welcome to join us.

And it's a belief that that it's going to have a real impact.

In our community for, as you said, from K through adulthood, students of all ages.

Right, right.

And even beyond, eve before we have, you know, folks sharing their expertise about early childhood.

So birth to five, even too.

But but yeah, we again, the goal of the conference or one of the goals is to celebrate and just really, bring community members together, to share encouragement and inspiration.

But then also have them leave with practical ideas so that they can go back to the families that they serve and have more resources.

Well, it also shows that, Elmo is needed [ha, ha, ha] in all different languages and all different cultures.

There's, Elmo.

That's right.

Yeah.

Our thanks to WQPT Educational Outreach Director, Melissa Gravert.

The countdown to the 4th of July continues, and this year's Independence Day, of course, is special.

It is the 250th birthday of our country.

Now, over the past few months, we've asked Quad City residents about their contributions to our society.

What was their Civic Spar that helped them decide the path they chose?

We asked Rock Island-Milan School Superintendent Doctor Sharon Williams about her Civic Spark.

[quiet music] [music ends] Our thanks to Rock Island- Milan School Superintendent Doctor Sharon Williams telling us about her Civic Spark.

On the air, on the radio, on the web, on your mobile device and streaming on your computer, thanks for taking some time to join us.

As we talk about the issues on The Cities.

[livley music] [music ends]