Lots of things going on! The students at present are observing the winter constellations with Saturn and Jupiter. It's a teacher's dream to have them both in the sky at the same time!

Interesting Facts About The 2002 Winter Night Sky by Ana Rodriguez and Francis Jimenez.  Jupiter is bright overhead in Gemini and is beginning to move east across Gemini. Next year at this time, Jupiter will be nearing Leo. It takes Jupiter twelve years to go around the sun, so it spends about one year in each constellation along the ecliptic (path of the sun, moon, and planets across the sky).  The next time Jupiter will be back in its present location in Gemini is 12 years from now, when we will be 23 years old. Saturn is in Taurus now, and will be back in that location 29 1/2 years from now, when we will be 41 years old!  After this year, we will not see Jupiter and Saturn together in the night sky again until 20 years from now. The next time they will be together side by side (conjunction) in Taurus will be 800 years from now.

Observing Logs.  Alfred Munoz and Brandon Mojica are using the school telescopes nightly to view the movement of the moons of Jupiter.  Ivan Soto: 2-19-02: It was cold and clear and a lot of stars. I found Aldebaran and Sirius using the Belt of Orion as a guide. I found Jupiter very bright overhead and Saturn by the red star, Aldebaran. The 6-Day Moon was bright with several maria.  Karen Santillan: 2-20-02: I saw Orion's Belt at 7:00pm.  It was a clear sky so you could see lots of stars. I found Jupiter, very bright overhead, in Gemini.  Alfred Munoz: 2-19-02: I set up the telescope in my front yard with my two brothers and a neighbor. When I went inside to get my paper, my brother screamed "I found something!" It was Jupiter, shiny and white.

Starshine Satellite Project.   Our TSYA kids are preparing one of the mirrors that will cover the satellite and later monitor its path. The Starshine Satellite looks like a big disco-mirror ball. It will measure variations in density of the earth's upper atmosphere during solar storms. The list of students participating will be placed aboard the satellite. Check out  http://www.azinet.com/starshine

Remember the crayon x-ray drawings?: Eric Schlegel, astrophysicist at Harvard-Smithsonian, emailed me, asking me for 20 of the crayon drawings of Chandra X-ray images the kids entered in the ASP Invisible Universe Art Contest last summer. They will be printed in the Proceedings Book of the 2001 ASP Chandra X-ray Symposium, to illustrate various x-ray objects being researched by the astrophysicists who attended the conference.