The planetariums and museums in the Minnesota GeoDome Network are rising to the challenges of Earth and space science education in 2020. We’re proud to say that WorldViewer has helped, enabling live presentations through virtual education platforms.

At Mayo Planetarium, Paul Larson is using WorldViewer to teach K12 students across the school district lessons ranging from the relationship between the sun, moon and stars, to plate tectonics and volcanoes. He’s incorporating all the diverse types of content supported by WorldViewer and the Open Playground extension’s ability to interact with third-party applications. At Mayo, this means using the OpenPlayground – Astronomy version to feature interactive data visualizations like this lunar image from OpenSpace.

Network members are also continuing community outreach with shows for the public.  Minnesota State University at Moorhead, Como Elementary, and the Journey Museum are set up for live streaming, bringing content into homes through widely used platforms like YouTube 360 and Facebook.

We’re looking forward to another year of working with the network, which is led by the Bell Museum. Our goal is to support the member institutions as they collaborate and share resources, for both virtual and in-person learning.