BANGOR – A middle school teacher with a passion for astronomy is one of seven educators across the country to be recognized by a national aerospace education foundation for helping to excite students about math and science.

Paula Leavitt, who teaches sixth grade at the James F. Doughty Middle School in Bangor, was among the winners of the 2005 American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Foundation Educator Achievement Award.

She and the other teachers will travel to Washington, D.C., next week, where they will be recognized during several events.

The AIAA Foundation’s mission is to enhance and support the visibility of aerospace professionals by funding student programs and research opportunities and by recognizing outstanding individual contributions.

Since its inception in 1997, the award has been presented to 21 kindergarten through grade 12 teachers who continue to be leaders in aerospace education.

For Leavitt, the award is icing on the cake – a tribute to a job that she loves and looks forward to every day.

“I can’t think of anything I’d rather do,” said Leavitt, 58, who has taught at the Doughty school for 21 years.

“My one love in life is science,” she said recently during an interview in her classroom.

Striving to present lessons that are “hands-on and relevant,” Leavitt likes to assign projects that pupils can bring home and share with their families.

By “taking science out of the classroom,” they get a better grasp of the subject, she said. “If you can explain something to your moms and dads, you now understand it.”

Pulling one project after another off her jampacked shelves to demonstrate her educational techniques, Leavitt said she gleaned some of her ideas from workshops and came up with others on her own.

One project requires pupils to use a toilet paper roll and black cardboard, among other things, to create a spectroscope that defracts – or bends – light into separate colors. “This is so cool,” said the teacher, noting that students peer through the object to determine the gases that are in the stars.

“They’re doing what scientists actually do,” she said.

Another project helps students understand how inventions created for space are adapted to everyday life.

“I love this thing,” she said, holding up an object made out of two styrofoam cups that move within each other and are attached by three cords equally spaced around the rims.

When the cups are rotated, the cords intersect and tighten around an object in the center – similar to the robotic devices used by spaceships to retrieve hazardous materials. Robotics commonly are used in a variety of applications here on Earth, she explains to students.

One of her favorite projects requires students to build solar cars that can be no bigger than 1 foot by 2 feet. They help students understand that solar power is used in space.

“Until you do things, kids don’t get it,” Leavitt said. “They don’t have an accurate picture in their heads. Once they see it, the light goes on because it makes more sense.”

Leavitt, who helped get Bangor’s Challenger Learning Center off the ground, said she loves science because it’s constantly changing.

“The kids think I know everything, but I try to stress to them that what I’m teaching now won’t be what people learn in 10 years. That’s good – it means we’re always discovering something new.”

Each day, during a 10-minute schoolwide reading period, she sits at her desk and peruses magazine and newspaper articles about the latest scientific discoveries. “Then I can instantly share it with my students.”

For Leavitt, “science is the subject I can grab kids with.” The teacher has no trouble getting students to do their science homework. Disciplinary problems in science class are rare.

“You can tell their interest level is up by the number of questions they ask,” she said.

She enjoys peppering her language with technical terms. “I like science words. They’re so cool,” she said, recalling the laughs that typically ensue when students hear about “galactic cannibalism” – where one galaxy devours another with its gravitational pull.

Leavitt also tries to encourage students in their scientific aspirations. “I keep telling the kids that everyone has the potential to discover something new,” said the teacher, who points out that if students find a new star or develop a new theory they get to name it after themselves.

“Someday I might see your names,” she tells them.