His Classroom is a Wind Tunnel

At a time when advances in technology increase at warp speed, the recent upward trend of student math and science proficiency test scores is encouraging. Aeronautical engineer Jack Boyd, Sloan '66, is using time he originally planned for retirement travel to work to continue the trend.

In 1993, Boyd accepted an invitation to return to the Ames Research Center in Mountain View, Calif., where he had worked for 39 years, to serve as special projects director of NASA-Ames Aerospace Encounter (AAE). The interactive educational program -- the only one of its kind in the region -- is equipped with hands-on labs designed to spark children's interest in math, science, and technology.

The thousands of enthusiastic letters Boyd receives each year from children who have visited the facility signify that AAE is indeed exciting. A staff of three full-time teachers and 40 docents guides small groups of 8- to 12-year-olds through the exhibits, which are located inside a 6,000-square-foot renovated supersonic wind tunnel. Students use high-resolution computer workstations to learn about computational fluid dynamics, and they design and test their own aircraft for efficiency and cost-effectiveness by using a specially designed "what if" software program. At one of the most popular exhibits, they practice transmitting data between replicas of a space station and Mission Control.

AAE also sponsors workshops for teachers and serves as a resource center for educators who are preparing science curricula for their students. In the near future, Boyd hopes, AAE programs will be put on the Internet to make them accessible to students throughout the country.

Boyd, whose work on projects such as the Mars and Venus space probes has won him national recognition, credits his seventh-grade teacher with igniting his interest in science. He frequently visits Bay Area elementary schools to talk about careers in science and technology. Boyd believes kids will turn on to science if they are exposed to exciting concepts at an early age. "You can show fifth-graders an equation about lift and drag, and they get it!" he says.

-- Heidi Garfield

Stanford Business School Magazine
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