Would you like a station camera to snap a picture of your hometown?  You may get that chance.  How?  With EarthKAM. 

EarthKAM, Earth Knowledge Acquired by Middle School Students, is the name of a NASA program using a camera to let students take pictures in a scientific study of Earth from space.  Students have direct access to, and control of, a digital camera mounted on the Space Station! 

Students command EarthKAM’s digital camera, which is connected to a laptop computer on the station.  Images are downlinked to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.  From there, images are sent to EarthKAM Mission Operation Center, located at the University of California San Diego.  College students then process the raw images and post them on the Internet.

The EarthKAM pilot project, KidSat, had students identify landmarks in shuttle pictures.  Is a black area burned forest or shadow?  A previous picture may answer the question.  If not, students can go on field trips or, via the Internet, ask people who live there.  Some kids overlaid images of rivers with old maps to see how the courses of the rivers had changed.

EarthKAM images help people see and understand how the environment is changing.  They just might convince people to plant more trees, stop dumping waste into lakes and oceans, and maybe build factories in space where pollution isn’t a problem.

Dr. Sally Ride created the ISS EarthKAM as a way to experience the awe that she felt looking down at Earth from Space.  "No other NASA program gives students such direct control of an instrument flying on a spacecraft orbiting Earth," said Dr. Karen Flammer, EarthKAM's Project Director. "As a result of this hands-on, real world experience, students assume an unparalleled personal ownership in the study and analysis of their Earth photographs."