Planetarium doubles shows after success

North Hills School District residents and students can get a double dose of learning about Galileo, Mars and other astronomical topics through the district's planetarium shows.

Planetary exploration, space probes, weather-related phenomena and recent discoveries in dark matter and dark energy fields will be featured this year when the planetarium features 10 shows, double last year's amount.

"There's been a very good response to the program we've done," said Sue Batson, director of the high school planetarium. "I'm trying to offer this as a service to the community and it's an excellent way to educate the general public. It's a way for the school to give back to the community."

District spokeswoman Tina Vojtko said school officials work with the Ross recreation department to make sure programming is not redundant.

"We don't want to duplicate services. We want to make sure we're working together to complement one another," Vojtko said.

In addition to shows for younger audiences, such as "Zubenelgenubi's Magical Sky," there are in-depth shows designed for people of all ages. The programs are free and start Sept. 10.

"I try to write some of the programs myself or obtain programs that will touch upon some of the newer advances in astronomy," Batson said. "A lot of planetary exploration is based on probes, such as Cassini-Huygens around Saturn and Galileo around Jupiter. That's a good source of new information."

Cassini-Huygens is to reach Saturn on July 1. The Galileo probe ends its 14-year mission by plummeting into Jupiter on Sept. 21.

Batson said the program's goal is to bring more families to the planetarium than it did last year. She did not have attendance figures for last year.

"It's a way for parents to model their own learning to their children -- a way to show the students in the community that we don't stop learning when we graduate," she said.

Additional Information:

Seeing stars

The first planetarium show of the new year will be 'A Celebration of Galileo -- The Man and the Spaceship' at Sept. 10 at 7 p.m. in the planetarium at North Hills High School, 53 Rochester Road.

For more information on the nine other programs offered throughout the year, check for details on calendar on the district's Web site: www.nhsd.net .

For more information on the Cassini-Huygens probe, go to saturn.jpl.nasa.gov .

For more information on the Galileo probe, go to www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo .