 I'm Lynn Bondaran, Director of Curriculum and Evaluation at the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. All of us at the Challenger Center are pleased to learn that your class will soon be flying a simulation at one of our mission sites. Now a simulation is not like going to an amusement park and riding a ride, but it's more like being on a motion picture set where each one of you will be a star in a future space flight mission. Once your class arrives at the mission site, you'll be divided into two groups. One group will begin the simulation in the mission control, the other group in the simulator, which is a spacecraft somewhere in space. Everyone who participates in a simulation is very important to the success of the mission. As such, each one of you will be assigned to a team. Your team will have certain things that you must do that relate to the mission. Members of each team will have workstations in both mission control and the simulator. During each mission, you will work both in mission control and the simulator. In mission control, you will work at one of the various councils. Team members in mission control guide the spacecraft through various aspects of the flight. As mission controllers, you will supply the flight crew and the simulator with information and images needed to complete their task. At the councils, you will also receive information to record from the crew and the simulator. Sometimes you will be able to see live images from the simulator. The monitors at the front of mission control reflect what is occurring in the simulator, the status of the mission, and will also show data or video images. As mission controllers, you have a very important role that involves communications and interactions with the crew and the simulator. Your job is to help them solve their problems. It is your responsibility to know which tasks the crew and the simulator is doing. Task cards will help you do this. Every workstation in the simulator and all of the councils and mission control have a set of task cards that relate to the jobs that their team must do during the simulation. Each task card has the steps required to complete a specific task. Notice that the task card has a start and end code. You are to enter the start code when you begin a task and the end code when it is completed. To do this, you will use the Q-pad at your workstation. A Q-pad is not difficult to use. As an example, watch as I enter the start code from one of the data team task cards. The start code number is 38701. Make sure you enter the correct code. After I have entered the start code, I press the send button. Once I have sent the start code, the mission status board changes to let mission control know what the data team is doing. Watch the mission status board change as I push the send button. During your mission, you are going to return to the moon. You are going to build on what was learned during the Apollo program. Your job is to gather information during your flight which can be studied later in order to establish a mining base on the moon. The tasks associated with the mission are to be carried out here in the simulator. If you are a member of the lunar geology team, you will work at this station. From here, you can teleoperate vehicles on the moon's surface. Teleoperations means that you are able to operate something from afar. You do not need to be right there to make it work. The lunar geology team will also study moon rocks in the glove box. The medical team studies the effects of space travel on the crew. Is there a difference in the effect of the 0G environment of moon orbit and the 1 6G moon environment on the health of the crew? G stands for the word gravity. You will do tasks to evaluate the crew's health. If you are assigned to work at the isolation chamber, you will use robots to handle and study various materials including lunar core samples outside of the spacecraft. Those of you assigned to the life support team will be involved in checking out the various systems that produce the artificial environment that keeps the astronauts alive. During the first half of the mission, the navigation team will be busy choosing the best landing site for your spacecraft. During the second half, the navigation team determines the correct orbit to launch onto from the lunar surface for eventual return to Earth. The navigation team members will also have several other navigation tasks to complete. As data team members, you will send messages and supply data to the various teams. You will also make measurements on some of the lunar images. Probe team members will be involved in checking out a probe that will be used to gather information about the moon. Capcom and Mission Control and Simcom and the simulator will be kept busy asking for answers and providing input as necessary to make the entire mission operate smoothly. Good luck in completing all of your tasks during your return to the moon. A visit to a Challenger Center mission site will certainly enable you to touch the future as you carry out your space mission. Yet it's not too impossible to dream that someday you may be an actual crew member aboard a spacecraft destined to return to the moon or journey to Mars. But whatever the future holds for each of you, remember to always aim for the stars.