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Fallen Arecibo Observatory to be Transformed into STEM Education Centre

posted by janrinok on Saturday October 15 2022, @11:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the crash-course(s) dept.
Career & Education News

upstart writes:

Fallen Arecibo Observatory to be transformed into STEM education centre:

The famous observatory, once the largest radio telescope on Earth, collapsed in 2020 after a number of its cables began to fail.

The US National Science Foundation (NSF) has decided to turn the iconic Arecibo Observatory into a STEM-focused education centre.

The 305-metre radio telescope, made internationally famous by movies such as GoldenEye and Contact, was regarded as a beacon for breakthrough science.

The observatory operated for 57 years but was set to be decommissioned in 2020 after a series of incidents left it damaged beyond repair. The platform collapsed at the end of 2020 after a third cable snapped off.

Before the observatory collapsed, the NSF stated that even if repairs were made to Arecibo, the structure would still present long-term stability issues. Rather than rebuild, the NSF has decided to turn the site into a multidisciplinary centre to serve as a hub for STEM education and outreach.

The new education centre will work to promote learning and teaching within STEM and broaden participation. The centre will also seek to build and leverage existing and new collaborations and support fundamental STEM education research.

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(1)

  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Sunday October 16 2022, @09:57AM (2 children)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane (4757) on Sunday October 16 2022, @09:57AM (#1276823)

    collapsed in 2020 after a number of its cables began to fail.

    While that's factually true, what's important here is that Arecibo telescope collapsed because of gross lack of maintenance, itself caused by severe budget cuts from the NSF that's been trying to get rid of it since the early naughties. They got what they wanted in the end, with a lot of help from the humid Puerto Rican climate.

    And now of course, to nobody's surprise, the NSF turns it into something a lot more profitable - apparently in this case, a college / university thing of some denomination.

    Shame on the NSF.

    • (Score: 2) by Gaaark on Sunday October 16 2022, @01:44PM

      by Gaaark (41) Subscriber Badge on Sunday October 16 2022, @01:44PM (#1276835) Journal

      Sounds like a bad commercial:
      "I've fallen... and i can't get up!"
      "That's okay, Mr. Arecibo, we're sending someone over right now to kick you in the nuts."

      --
      --- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday October 16 2022, @09:41PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday October 16 2022, @09:41PM (#1276894) Journal
      Notice the buzzword phrase: "multidisciplinary centre to serve as a hub for STEM education and outreach". This has been NSF's thing since the late 1990s when I looked into what it would take to get NSF funding.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by ElizabethGreene on Sunday October 16 2022, @04:54PM

    by ElizabethGreene (6748) on Sunday October 16 2022, @04:54PM (#1276852)

    I don't understand the messaging here.

    "Here's this really cool thing we used to have, but now it's broken because we couldn't be bothered to do basic maintenance. Learn science, kids."

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