Travis Plowman has one of the best jobs in the world. The director of Starbase Atlantis, Norfolk, an education program for children, he's in the business of helping others solve mysteries - and have some fun along the way. For children in the Norfolk Public Schools who have struggled to understand the complex principles of math and science, Travis is a godsend.

Established in 1995, the Starbase Atlantis program is the result of a partnership among public schools, area businesses and the U.S. Navy. Travis, his two assistants and Navy volunteers use computer simulation, aerodynamics and abundant resources on the Norfolk Navy Base, where the program is offered, to unlock the mysteries of math and science. "We want to show our students that learning can be fun."

Fifth-grade students from 13 Norfolk Public Schools participate in the program, which is designed for at-risk children. "As an educator, to me, an at-risk student is anyone who is in jeopardy of failing and having to repeat a grade or go to summer school to be remediated."

A native of Abilene, Texas, Travis retired from the Navy after serving 20 years as both an enlisted sailor and officer. Searching for a new challenge, he turned to Old Dominion's Military Career Transition Program, which trains people separating from the military to become teachers. He earned his master's in education in 1994 and then became the first director of Starbase Norfolk.

He refers to the program as a school without walls. The secret, he said, is to reach beyond the limits of traditional education and beyond the limits of children's imaginations to show them how the principles of math and science affect them every day. Travis calls this concept "reality application." "The days of taking students on field trips are few and far between because public schools are so afraid of liability issues. But the students are the ones who lose out when we don't make that reality application, because then they're sitting in a classroom with four walls, being told what to learn, how to learn, when to learn and what to regurgitate back on the test."

"We take the complete opposite approach. We give them the freedom to learn. They come into our classroom and we don't tell them what they are going to learn or what's happening in the experiment. They come up to the front of the classroom and perform the experiment, and then we take them through questioning techniques so that they're providing the answers. Once you've discovered the right answer, it's much easier to remember than if I just told you."

Travis sees his students one day a week for five weeks, using the entire Navy base as part of his classroom. "The students will begin in the classroom where they'll do experiments that demonstrate Bernoulli's principle of lift, for example. Then they'll go into the computer lab and use gaming and simulation software to fly a plane. They fly flight simulations from NAS Norfolk to NAS Oceana. So they're applying geometry and navigation skills, as well as the principles they learned in the classroom. Also, all of the students build their own rockets and on graduation day they launch them." Approximately 850 fifth-graders complete the program each year, and Travis plans to include sixth-graders next year.

There are two other Starbase commands in Pensacola and Whiting Field, Fla. Nineteen sites on Navy bases across the nation, from San Diego to Groton, Conn., are connected to the three main hubs via satellite. Travis sometimes teaches as many as 100 students at a time with the aid of volunteers at the satellite stations. An adjunct professor of history at Hampton University, Travis is also pursuing a doctorate in higher education administration at George Washington University. He has published several papers on the success of Starbase in hopes of getting the word out about what the kids in Norfolk are accomplishing.

"Our research shows that the program is a success," he says, and points to another important measure of his students' success. At the end of the second year of the program, 83 percent of the parents surveyed reported they had noticed an increased interest in math and science in their children. Seventy-two percent indicated their children had an increased interest in school in general.

A number of other people think the program has done pretty well, too. In 1996, it received the Governor's Partnership in Education Horizon Award, which is granted to the single-most innovative new program in operation two years or less; in 1997, it won a Virginia Tech's Excellence in Education Award, one of only 12 in the state; and last spring, Starbase was one of 50 learning programs to participate in the President's Summit on America's Future.

Travis sees even greater things ahead for Starbase Atlantis.

"I love the program and I would like to stay with it as long as possible; however, my research and teaching capabilities are limited here. I would really like to teach on the university level where I can use my experiences to teach others how to be successful in the classroom."

- Pamela Chandler Lee