Call for Questions: Discovery Education Virtual Field Trip to the International Space Station

Through our partnership with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Discovery Education has been given the exciting opportunity to host a Virtual Field Trip to the International Space Station! We are inviting students around the world to submit questions for a chance to have them answered by astronauts aboard the space station.

Submitting a Question for the Astronauts

  1. Submit your student’s question using the form below.
  2. We will not be able to include every question we receive. We will review all submissions and select which ones will be shared with NASA.
  3. If your question is selected, we will contact you with further instructions for how to film the question. (Your student will need to be comfortable appearing on camera, should their question be selected.)
  4. NASA will then review the final list of videos and select which ones will be shared with the astronauts

Question Guidelines from NASA (All question submissions must follow these guidelines.)

  1. Ask only a single question.
  2. No questions about religion or politics.
  3. No questions about aliens.
  4. No questions about humanoid robots (ex: Robonaut, Valkyrie).
  5. No questions about bodily functions (including crying in space).
  6. No questions that put astronauts on the spot to share personal information, such as questions about their families, how they are coping with Coronavirus, etc.
  7. Do not ask an astronaut or NASA to endorse anything.

Tips for Asking Interesting Questions

  1. Questions should not be things you can look up on the Internet (i.e., how fast is the space station traveling?)
    • Try to ask them questions only they can answer. Ex: questions about their experiences in space, their responsibilities on the space station, daily life in space, their favorite things about being an astronaut, what they do for fun, what a launch feels like, etc.
  2. Questions involving a demonstration of microgravity are welcome and encouraged!
    • Ex: “Can you do a flip?”, questions about how water/liquids behave in space, etc.

The deadline for submitting questions is 11:00 PM ET on December 31, 2022.

If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected] ** Please note that, due to the complicated and ever-shifting responsibilities of the space station crew, there is always a possibility that the Virtual Field Trip will be delayed or cancelled as a result of circumstances outside of our control. If this event does move forward, it will occur during the first half of the 2023 school year, with more information to follow once a specific date is selected.