We have designed ISS Watch, a NASA iPad application that educates the public about what’s going on onboard the International Space Station.

Our team of master's students has designed and prototyped ISS Watch, a new iPad application that immerses high school students in the purpose of and activities on the International Space Station (ISS). This application serves as an iPad component of NASA's overarching ISS Live! project, which aims to increase public awareness of ISS activities by releasing real-time crew schedules and sensor data (telemetry) to the public. ISS Live! itself emerged from the need to engage the public with activities on the International Space Station, and our application attempts to bring NASA back into the public's lives by educating the next generation of American youth about the station.

Through live astronaut schedules, trending news, and multimedia, students can explore galleries of content on ISS Watch to understand what life is like on the station and what is happening there now. In doing so, the application shares a glimpse of the world behind front stage ISS events in a way that caters to all interest levels, so that everyone can appreciate the planning and preparation that support station activities.

The application is centered around this live astronaut schedule that is being made public through the ISS Live! project; this is exciting because it is based on the same planning tools that flight controllers use to manage missions. Through this schedule, ISS Watch tracks station activities as they happen and provides supporting material to let students explore more. To supplement the schedule, a dynamic panel containing media feeds provides students with the latest news and views to stir wonderment, while an adjoining media gallery and a profile of the current expedition lead to resources to satiate their curiosity.