Every year The Henry Ford College Public Outreach Program in Astronomy and Education, hosts people of all age groups to come and learn about astronomy. This year, beginning in October and ending on December 5th, over six hundred children, the majority of which were fifth graders from Dearborn Public Schools, were invited to explore the campus to experience this unique learning opportunity.

The participants of this walk are given tours of three different activities; the University of Michigan Dearborn observatory, the HFC Hammond Planetarium, and the solar system walk located on the HFC campus. UM-D collaborated with HFC, giving the students access to their observatory, where they learned about astronomy through interactions with telescopes, as well as presentations done by volunteers.

Other activities the students participated in included touring a scaled down model of the solar system. Astronomy students from HFC led the children through the planets in order, answering questions as well as providing the participants with information about each display. The last activity was a presentation in the HFC Hammond Planetarium. The Ford Amateur Astronomy Club, of Ford Motor Company, were involved and played a huge role, giving the planetarium presentations as well as helping guide the solar system walks.

Steven Murrell, an instructor of physics and astronomy as well as the director of the HFC Hammond Planetarium said “This year was a little difficult because of weather and coordinating. There were problems getting volunteers for when the kids came.” Murrell said, “Fortunately I had students that helped this year. We had a bit of a cold spell which made it hard for the kids and their guides, but overall it went well and the kids had a great time.”

This program is a free community service that has been going on for the last ten years. Murrell took over the program from his predecessor Michael LoPresto, and has been running it for the last five years.

“I’m passionate about astronomy, and astronomy education, it’s very important,” Murrell states. “It’s neat seeing the kids get interested in it as well. Over the span of an hour or two, you can see some of them develop an interest in astronomy. If they come back and take the class with us when they are older that would be great.”

In the future, Professor Murrell is hoping to integrate the Magic Planet globe, located in the HFC Science building, into the educational tours. The Magic Planet is a large spherical globe that will project on its surface a likeness of the Sun as well as other planetary terrains and weather patterns.

The HFC planetarium projector has been at the college for over fifty years, and remains well maintained. The planetarium gained its namesake from a local donor named Guy Hammond who, after he passed, gave the college $100,000 dollars to go toward maintaining the equipment. The astronomy department puts on free planetarium shows in order to educate the general public about science and astronomy. To learn more information regarding planetarium presentations, the schedules are posted in the science building in front of the planetarium, room S-102.