Robby Klein
When the astronauts on the International Space Station beamed into Children’s Hospital this past spring, it wasn’t just the kids who were excited. Mamie Shepherd, who oversees Seacrest Studios at the hospital, was just as elated.
The space-loving Shepherd and her team worked in partnership with NASA, ARISS (Amateur Radio on the International Space Station), the Hospital School Program, and many community partners and supporters to develop a program to teach kids about life on the International Space Station while educating patients in the areas of STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts, and Mathematics).
Robby Klein
On a normal day, Shepherd keeps things at Seacrest Studios running in person. The in-hospital radio station gives children and teens the opportunity to express their creative side through radio, television, and new media. Children can sing along with special musical guests (famous faces stop by daily), get behind the mic for radio interviews, or try their hand at producing a television program. But in the time of COVID, running the studio is a lot like the call to the International Space Station, with virtual programming brightening the days of kids in every bed of the hospital. But the challenge to change things up didn’t scare Shepherd.
“Mister Rogers said: ‘How can we make goodness attractive?’ I think about that professionally and personally,” she says. “Things in this world can be brutal, but we don’t have to react brutally. I see goodness in the smallest among us in a children’s hospital. That goodness challenges me to be better, speak better, and do better.”