6 May 2026

As usual, our team has been quite busy.  Between major progress on Agavi, reorganization of the Greenworks program, and travel by me and our volunteers to conferences and Brazil, it’s been a very busy few months.  Check out some of the major updates below!

Welcome to our New Team Members!

We are happy to welcome a number of new people to the Science Voices organization.  Joining us this year are Aadya Kapoor, Aditi Chawla (via the Blue Marble Space Young Scientist Program), Andrei Popa, Luciano Kalian, and Paras Adlakha.

Aadya and Paras are both working with the Greenworks program.  Aadya is gaining volunteer experience in social media as she develops the stories of Vale do Ribeira, Brazil, for posting later this year.  Paras is working on sociotechnical research on the Vale do Ribeira communities in order to help us better understand the intersection between economics, technology, and society so that we can improve our Greenworks and Agavi programs operating in the area.

Meanwhile, Aditi, Andrei, and Luciano are currently working on Agavi.  Andrei is providing support as we transition to a partial AI workforce to aid in the more rapid prototyping of Agavi for testing.  Aditi and Luciano will be working on astronomy, geology, and biology simulators and widgets that will be available as standalone versions for use in the classroom as well as fully integrated into the Agavi platform in order to unlock more features.

Greenworks Reorganization

We reorganized the Greenworks program slightly as we work to broaden its reach.  This helps us better separate the components that are best fit for teachers, students, and schools and those that are best fit for everyone else who wants to participate.

Agavi Progressing Rapidly

Although we’ve had a number of false starts with Agavi, we have finally honed in on a winning formula and are making rapid progress.  Giane, João, and Alex have hit multiple major milestones in the last month and we are aiming to complete the first prototype by the end of July, at which point we’ll begin field testing in Brazil and Ukraine.  You can be a part of the pilot program as well!  Sign up today to be notified when we begin testing.

Various Visits

The team has been on the move over the past few months, which has helped us build up our camaraderie.  In January, I met up with the board of directors (Fabia and Tara) in Michigan and Arizona respectively to discuss strategy for 2026.  I also dropped by California to meet up with David and Daniel at their new home, California State University Monterey Bay, where they will be for the next couple of years.  They’ve been busy building a club to help feed ideas and prototypes into the new Greenworks Workshop that they are building.  Additionally, in April they participated in the Cubesat Developers Workshop as we begin to explore integrating microsatellites into the Greenworks network.

Additionally, after a biking adventure in Chile, Sarah came to visit Brazil for a month to get hands-on experience with the Greenworks and Beeworks projects.  During her time in Brazil, we also met up with Lara, who does user interface design for Agavi, and took a field trip out to Vale do Ribeira.  During the expedition, we visited the Tekoa Nhanderu Porã Tupi-Gurani Indigenous Reserve to take a look at the bees and talk about Agavi for use in their local classrooms, the Atlantic Rain Forest for an exploratory hike, the Guapiruvu community to partake in local festivals and meet with the locals, and chatted with Gilberto about agroforestry and Beeworks.  We also did a half-day event for kids and teens about building greenhouses on Mars where we explored soil, plants, solar panels, and orbital dynamics.  They seemed to have a lot of fun, especially with the rocket!  Back in Campinas, Sarah and I visited Airbnbee to do some real-life testing on Sarah’s bee sensors, which she developed for her Blue Marble Space Young Scientist Program last year.  We had fun, but the bees seemed quite annoyed at all the foreign equipment near their front door.