From the Classroom to Orbit: Teacher in Space Travels Six Million Miles
April 28, 2010 by Amy Buffenbarger
Filed under Featured News, Top Stories
By John Rosales
Last week, former teacher Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger was in outer space. As a mission specialist on the Discovery Space Shuttle, she and the crew of six other astronauts landed April 20 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. They’d been in space for 15 days and orbited the Earth 238 times.
For Metcalf-Lindenburger, the space voyage was the culmination of a dream journey that began in 2004 when she was a science teacher and cross country coach at Hudson’s Bay High School in Vancouver, Washington.
Former teacher Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger orbits Earth aboard the Discovery.
At the time, one of Metcalf-Lindenburger’s astronomy students asked her how astronauts use the bathroom in space. She didn’t know. When she went to the NASA website to find the answer, she stumbled across a NASA post for the Educator Astronaut program, which recruits teachers for the astronaut corps and helps NASA find new ways to connect space exploration to the classroom. She applied.
“When she first told me about applying to NASA, we were out on a run after school,” says Tom Petersen, a teacher at Hudson’s Bay and member of the Vancouver Education Association (VEA). “I gave her the name of an astronaut (Clay Anderson) I know to seek out and maybe ask him some questions concerning this career choice and what to expect.”
That April, while teaching her third period integrated earth science class, Metcalf-Lindenburger received a call from Cape Canaveral that she had been selected to train as an astronaut.
“When this big a dream comes true, it’s unreal,” she said at the time.
Discovery’s trip included delivery of more than seven tons of equipment and supplies to the International Space Station. Metcalf-Lindenburger assisted spacewalking astronauts by manipulating Discovery’s robotic arm. She also transferred cargo to the station, including three large racks of scientific experiments.
Opportunities for more teachers to launch into space are limited. There are only three shuttle missions remaining before the space shuttle fleet is retired.
“Mrs. M-L” or “Dottie,” as she is known to former students and colleagues, spent the last six years training to be a mission specialist. At age 34, Metcalf-Linderburger is the youngest NASA astronaut to go into space.
“Sometimes it is hard to fathom orbiting the Earth and experiencing weightlessness, and all the hard physical training the astronauts have to go through,” Petersen says. “I keep at the front of my classroom a picture of Dottie and of Clay as inspiration for my students, along with numerous clippings of what these two are doing.”
When the STS-131 team of astronauts launched into space on April 5, Petersen and about 25 other Hudson’s Bay staff and alumni attended the event.
“Dottie inspired kids while she was at Hudson’s Bay,” Petersen says. “It showed when several of her former students went to the launch.”
Metcalf-Lindenburger still considers herself a science teacher, says Petersen, and her mission on Earth is to continue helping kids get excited about studying science and math.
“Having Dottie at NASA now gives our district a golden opportunity to amp up some of its curriculum — whether it be physics or science,” he says.
Metcalf-Lindenburger, a former VEA member, and her husband, Jason, have a 3-year-old daughter, Cambria. For more, see her NASA bio, and classroom activities related to the space program. Also, view a video created by the Washington Education Association (WEA).
Educators might also be interested in the Teachers in Space program, which works with spaceflight companies to ensure that teachers are among those who have a chance to travel into space in the future. Unlike NASA’s Educator Astronaut program, which takes teachers out of the classroom to join the astronaut corps, Teachers in Space allows teachers to remain at their schools.
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