26 PUNCHMAGAZINE.COM {punchline} achievements by naming Asteroid 4859 “Asteroid Fraknoi.” While teaching at Foothill, Andrew saw an opportunity to make astronomy education more widely available by creating a lecture series in the college’s 950-seat theater. Called Silicon Valley Astronomy Lectures, it featured Nobel Prize winners and best-selling authors. NASA took an interest in the program and offered to sponsor it. “Foothill College administrators were so enthusiastic they allowed us to use the theater for free,” Andrew recounts. Soon Andrew began making the scientific talks available on YouTube so that anyone interested in space could hear from experts. “These nerdy lectures have received 4.1 million views,” he grins. “The astronomer Alex Filippenko’s videos explain the James Webb telescope, and it is like watching Columbus get his ships ready.” Andrew’s other focus centers on the search for life on other planets, which he pursues enmarried to his wife Lola, he realized the pace was unsustainable. In search of a less intense job, he applied for a teaching position at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, where he was quickly hired and began a lifelong devotion to teaching space education. “It was a very good fit,” he notes. “They have a lovely observatory run by an astronomy hobbyist and it was a job where I could have a life. I was there for 25 years and we grew the program significantly.” Andrew also taught at Cañada College in Woodside, where the enthusiastic public affairs officer connected him with KGO radio. He soon became a regular, and could also be found sharing his astronomical insights on KQED TV. “I was a cheap imitation of Carl Segan,” Andrew says humbly. The scientific community thought otherwise and the International Astronomical Union recognized his
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTcxMjMwNg==