Media Advisory

Red Springs, Bladenboro and Elizabethtown students
to get hands-on lesson aboard UNC's science bus

Media representatives are invited to climb aboard Discovery, one of the traveling science laboratories in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's Destiny science learning program, when it visits high schools in Red Springs, Bladenboro and Elizabethtown this week.

Tuesday (Nov. 28)
8 a.m. to 9:45 a.m.
11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
Red Springs High School
509 N. Vance Street, Red Springs
Students from one of Melodi Lowery's science, health and you classes and one of Erin Oxendine's biology classes will perform a lab exercise called Mystery of the Crooked Cell. Students will discover the molecular basis of sickle cell disease by using gel electrophoresis as a diagnostic tool to differentiate normal hemoglobin from hemoglobin found in individuals with sickle cell disease.

Wednesday (Nov. 29)
8 a.m. to 9:30 a.m.
11:41 a.m. to 1:20 p.m.
1:25 p.m. to 2:55 p.m.
West Bladen High School
1600 NC Highway 410, Bladenboro
Students from Pam Roberts' and Ruby Stephens' biology classes will perform a lab exercise called Case of the Crown Jewels. Students will assume the role of forensic scientists and perform DNA restriction analysis (popularly known as DNA fingerprinting) to analyze drops of blood and other kinds of evidence found at crime scenes as they determine which suspects are guilty or innocent.

Thursday (Nov. 30)
9:45 a.m. to 11:15 a.m.
11:50 a.m. to 1:20 p.m.
1:30 p.m. to 2:55 p.m.
East Bladen High School
5600 NC Highway 87 East, Elizabethtown
Students from Cheryl West's and Stephanie Hester's biology classes will perform a lab exercise called Case of the Crown Jewels. Students will assume the role of forensic scientists and perform DNA restriction analysis (popularly known as DNA fingerprinting) to analyze drops of blood and other kinds of evidence found at crime scenes as they determine which suspects are guilty or innocent.

The Destiny traveling science learning program is Morehead Planetarium and Science Center's formal science education initiative serving pre-college teachers and students across North Carolina. The program develops and delivers a standards-based, hands-on curriculum and teacher professional development with a team of educators and a fleet of vehicles that travel throughout the state.

Destiny and Discovery, two custom-built, 40-foot, 33,000-pound buses, bring the latest science and technology equipment to students who otherwise would not see a high-tech laboratory or what a career in science can offer. The modules described above are among 13 offered as part of Destiny's curriculum. All of Destiny's modules are aligned with the N.C. Standard Course of Study.

The science buses are a powerful visual images that heighten public awareness of the importance of and funding necessary for quality science education. Destiny first hit the road in 2000.

For more information, go to http://www.destiny.unc.edu.

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Destiny contact: Claire Bury, (919) 843-5915 or bury@unc.edu
News Services contact: Becky Oskin, (919) 962-8596 or becky_oskin@unc.edu