Space Station Astronauts Connect Live with Students and Administration Officials as Part of International Education Week

In conjunction with International Education Week (IEW), on Thursday, Nov. 15, the U.S. Department of Education, NASA, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, and the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) will host a live chat for students with astronauts, Suni Williams and Kevin Ford, who are on board the International Space Station.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education Tony Miller will join the discussion, along with NASA Associate Administrator for Education Leland Melvin, National Air and Space Museum Director Gen. J. R. "Jack" Dailey and Smithsonian Assistant Secretary for Education and Access Claudine Brown. Participants will engage in a discussion about living and working in space.

The 20-minute downlink will begin at 11:45 a.m., ET, and will air live on NASA Television and the agency's Web site. Administration officials and more than 200 students will connect with the space station from the Moving Beyond Earth gallery in the National Air and Space Museum. Approximately 10,000 students are expected to join via Webcast. Prior to the chat, beginning at 11:35 a.m., students will participate in an educational program.

Students participating in the live chat are engaged with the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP), an educational research project sponsored by NCESSE that enables students to design and send experiments to the space station.

This year's IEW theme is "International Education: Striving for a Healthier Future Worldwide." The first IEW was held in 2000 and, today, it is celebrated in more than 100 countries. This longstanding joint initiative of the U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of State encourages and promotes international education and exchange.

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