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"We rob science education of life when we focus solely on results and seek to train students to solve problems and recite facts without a commensurate emphasis on transporting them out beyond the stars." (Greene)

My personal experience with science education, in a public high school in small town America, nearly destroyed my curiosity and desire to pursue the mysteries of the world we live. I enjoyed humanities classes because I had the opportunity to be creative and original. In contrast, my science classes were torture, and I remember hours spent memorizing formulas and numbers.

Although in-depth science is impossible without this attention to technicality, middle-school and high-school students need to be captivated by the enormous potential that science has to unravel the mysteries of the universe, in order tempt them to study science beyond the minimum number of years required for a high school diploma. Students with a true curiosity in science, will then learn to "solve the problems" necessary and perhaps their studies truly will carry them "beyond the stars."