In public school curriculum, education about space/the universe is typically limited to our solar system and usually just comprised of learning about our 8 planets + our sun & Pluto.

I’ve been studying astrophysics for the past year and a half now and I’ve realized how little people are taught about the universe. What’s interesting about that though, is that people generally are very curious and interested in space, proper education about it is just not readily available unless they choose to study it further in college or individually.

Some popular myths about the universe are believed almost globally. A few off the top of my head:

A) commonly believed: the Big Bang Theory is how everything came to be. Truth: according to our laws of physics, something can not come from nothing, which means all matter in the universe existed prior to the Big Bang, just in a different form.

B) commonly believed: the sun is yellow and/or the color/consistency of fire. Truth: the sun is actually white in color; it appears yellow to us because of our atmosphere and light filtering. Majority of images of the sun are color edited.

C) commonly believed: you freeze instantly if exposed to the vacuum of space/things flash freeze. Truth: space is a vacuum, therefor there’s nothing really there to absorb your heat via convection like on Earth. Even inanimate objects will take some time to freeze over. It would take awhile to freeze to death. You’d suffocate far sooner.

Studying space, astronomy, astrophysics, etc. not only sparks curiously about our place in the universe and further interest in STEM subjects, but a lot of our technology is born from the study of space, even medical technology.

Do you think space education should be prioritized more in grade school education, or do you think there are other more important things that need to be emphasized more?