In
the online virtual world of "Universe Quest," young
girls can create characters that interact with
one another and operate a virtual telescope as
if it were real, obtaining actual images through
a small telescope in Arizona.
In the online virtual world of "Universe Quest," young girls can create characters that interact with one another and operate a virtual telescope as if it were real, obtaining actual images through a small telescope in Arizona. (UC Berkeley image) BERKELEY — Ruby Knight and Tiffany Farmer, sixth and seventh grade Girl Scouts at the ASA Academy in West Oakland, have never met Susan Murabona, an educator and astronomer in Nairobi, Kenya. Nor have they visited the Ironwood North Observatory (INO) in Queen Creek, Ariz., or talked to Lech Mankiewicz, an astrophysicist in Warsaw, Poland. But Ruby, Tiffany, Susan and Lech all got together via the Internet earlier this month to begin assembling an online game that will help girls around the world explore the cosmos and perhaps steer them toward careers in software development and information technology. "The Universe Quest Game," an immersive game similar to the popular multi-user virtual world called "Second Life," is being made possible by a $1.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to the University of California, Berkeley. "Girls have traditionally been left out of the pipeline to technology careers, and African Americans as well, and there is a strong sense that we need to reach these very talented populations," said Carl Pennypacker, UC Berkeley principal investigator of the "Universe Quest" project.
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