From City Lights to Moonlight: NASA Training Shows How Urban Parks Can Connect Communities with Space Science
When you think of the national park and terrestrial astronomy programs, you could imagine distant places far from the city’s lights. But a recent training on the land of NASA, funded by the NASA scientific activation program, calls into question the hypothesis, demonstrating how urban parks, wildlife refuges, museums and green spaces can be incredible places to connect communities to space science. Programs animated in urban areas can reach people where they already live, work and recreate. This creates continuous engagement opportunities, because participants in the urban astronomy program can discover that the sky above their neighborhoods contain the same wonders as distant places.
During the first week of August, in 2025, NASA Earth to Sky collaborated with the National Park Service and the US Fish and Wildlife Service to offer an innovative astronomy training program entitled “Rivers of Stars and Stories: Interpretation of the North Night” at Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge in Minneapolis-St. Paul. This three -day course brought together 28 interpreters from Ranger de Park, environmental educators and outdoor communicators in the region of twin cities. The presentations and discussions were focused on the commitment of the urban public with the wonders of space science by taking advantage of the advantages of metropolitan spaces and the unique opportunities that the city of the city offers.
Throughout this immersive training, the participants explored everything, lunar observations and the science of Aurora on the Artemis program of NASA and astrobiology. The training allowed participants by saying that everyone is an effective stargazer and nighttie, transforming beginners into confident astronomy communicators. A participant captured his experience by noting that they went from “not to know much about a much better understanding of the basic concepts and, above all, where to find more resources!” In addition to sharing resources, this training has also launched a community of practice where communicators can continue to collaborate. Participants are involved in discussions on how to respectfully incorporate local Aboriginal perspectives into the programming of astronomy and to honor the country’s traditional commissioners while avoiding credits or the false declaration of indigenous science.
The course has also created a sustainable community connection to NASA through presentations by NASA experts and demonstrations of NASA activity tools. As a participant noted in the evaluation, “this is only the beginning of a long learning trip, but I now know where to look for and how to find answers.” The tool boxes and shared resources included the game of the Nube (Cloud) of Globe (Global Learning & Observation for the benefit of the environment), the Heliophysical Education Activation Team (Cloud) of the observer, the Nasa Heliophysical Education Activation Team (Heat) and the Night Sky Network, the Night Netwel Citizen Science and the local Network of the Solar System Ambassador.
The feeling of belonging of participants in the Earth community in Sky has increased spectacularly. These results support NASA’s strategic objective of building a sustained public commitment with land and space science. Extremely positive feedback, with 100% of participants expressing their interest in taking more courses like this, demonstrates the enormous value it is for Sky to collaborate with the National Park Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service, because all the public communication objectives of all agencies are sent.
This type of collaborative work is crucial because it builds a network of scientific communicators who can reach thousands of visitors to Minneapolis-St. Paul parks, nature centers and outdoor spaces. By forming local informal educators to confidently share the NASA discoveries and missions, the program expands access to space science for urban public in the region of twin cities.
The Earth to Sky team will continue to promote these precious partnerships with the National Park Service and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, as well as other state and local organizations and non -profit organizations. Learn more about the work of Earth to Sky with the interpreters of the park and non-formal educators to share the science of the space of NASA by visiting: https://science.nasa.gov/scaccte-team/earth-to-sky/
Find out more about the way scientific activation links NASA scientific experts, real content and experiences with community leaders to make science to activate minds and promote a more in-depth understanding of our world and beyond: https://science.nasa.gov/learn/about-science-ctivation/.
