Bellaire will be participating in the Lunar and Planetary Institute lunar research program which gets students involved in actual lunar science research work and a chance to publish the results.
This program is designed to get high school students involved in current research projects in an attempt to encourage them enter lunar science or just science in general as a career choice. Teams of students are teamed with up-and-coming lunar scientists to spend most of the school year tackling an problem related to the moon. There is a lot of lunar geology involved but no experience is required. You learn everything along the way.
Students first spend a month learning about the moon from the basics up to current knowledge of the moon and its formation. Then one of the projects ideas is selected by the team and they tackle the issue however they choose to working with their mentor via the Internet and their teacher at the local school.
2009-2010 was the first year and only 4 school participated. All 4 projects were converted in published “conference posters” and displayed at a national conference. A team of scientists chose one team to attend the conference based on which project they thought was most insightful.
The research topic list is supplied by a team of scientists and the team chooses one of the topics to focus on. Most are related to age and surface characteristics of the lunar surface as part of a long-term effort to understand the formation and evolution of the moon and an effort to one day send people or robots to continue lunar exploration beyond the Apollo missions.
Interested students can sign up or just contact Mr. Newland.
Another excellent talk about The Lunar Poles from Ben Bussey 
