Green Valley student to join JASON Project

Wednesday, Sept. 12, 2001 | 8:16 a.m.

A Green Valley High School freshman will head to Alaska later this year as part of a yearlong nationwide science project.

Rick Anderson was selected from among thousands of applications worldwide as one of 24 students who will participate onsite in the JASON Project Jan. 28 through Feb. 8.

He joins Laughlin fifth grade teacher Patricia Moore on the project.

The students will be part of a team of researchers, eight teachers and the project's leader, explorer and scientist Robert Ballard, who will travel to Alaska for this year's project: "Jason XIII: Frozen Worlds."

Online reports and a live satellite link of the team's work will be sent to sites around the country, where they will be worked into school lesson plans.

Local students will be able to see the satellite broadcasts at Community College of Southern Nevada's Cheyenne Campus.

Anderson was selected for his outstanding leadership skills, passion for learning and interest in the project, according to JASON Project officials.

"For the past four years, I have watched and wondered what it would be like to be chosen as a student Argonaut, and now I am experiencing it first hand," Anderson said. 'I am interested in marine biology and I can't wait to explore Alaska as one of the expedition team members."

The JASON Project, a multi-disciplinary education program that gives students and teachers the opportunity to explore exotic locations around the world, features professional scientists, the Internet, supplemental videos, professional development for teachers and live interactive broadcasts. The students and teachers, called "argonauts," are exposed to leading scientists and researchers who will work with them all year to explore earth science.

Each year the project focuses on a new location.

Researchers from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Geological Survey and Alaska Sea Life Center will help students address these questions:

* How and why did people first come to settle in frozen worlds?

* What kinds of life exist in these cold regions?

* How do the life forms we find in the subarctic compare with what we find in the Arctic, or with life in Antarctica, the most isolated continent in the world?

For more information on the project, call 7999-6560.