The Wisconsin Idea heads south over winter break

Ryan Keenan, a graduate student in astronomy, was part of a UW group that traveled to Mexico in January. Keenan shows a telescope off to a younger student.

In January 2010, the Astronomy Department and UW Space Placecollaborated with the UW Center For Global Health in a service learning trip to Wisconsin's sister state of Jalisco, Mexico.

Generousy supported by the Ira and Ineva Reilly Baldwin Wisconsin Idea Endowment, the purpose of the visit was to engage UW students in an ongoing collaboration with their counterparts at the University of Guadalajara's (UDG) Centro Universitario de Los Altos (CUALTOS) campus.

The group helped facilitate community development, improved public health and educational activities in rural areas outside of Tepatitlan, Jalisco.

The group visited primary and secondary schools, educating students about health risks and hosting health fairs where vaccinations, testing for diabetes and high blood pressure, medicines and dental treatments for kids were made available to the community.

Lastly, the group hosted telescope building workshops and community stargazing events with twelve "Galileoscopes" donated by Space Place. The telescopes were given to rural schools and the outreach staff at the CUALTOS campus.

Future plans for collaboration between UW-Madison and UDG-CUALTOS include building identical sundials in both locations to allow students to repeat the measurement of the circumference of the Earth by Eratosthenes (3rd century B.C.) and an astronomy mini-conference to be held at UDG-CUALTOS in October 2010.