The GLOBE Program is an international hands-on environmental science and education program that connects K-12 students, teachers and scientists around the world for research collaboration and cross-cultural enrichment. It is exciting to know that some Alaska teachers and students are participating in the GLOBE Program which involves more than 10,000 schools in more than 95 countries. Soon many more Alaska students will be contributing to a "global" picture of the health of the earth as they monitor their local environment. The goals of the GLOBE Program are: to enhance the environmental awareness of individuals worldwide, to increase scientific understanding of the earth, and to improve student achievement in science and mathematics. Teachers receive special training and educational materials for implementing the GLOBE program. These include skill level-appropriate procedures for standardized scientific environmental measurements and learning activities on environmental topics which have been developed by a team of GLOBE scientists and educators. To ensure the usefulness of GLOBE student data for scientific research, environmental scientists from many nations have participated in selecting GLOBE environmental measurements, developing measurement procedures and ensuring overall quality control of data. Scientists around the world use GLOBE data in environmental research. Students under the guidance of GLOBE trained teachers, measure locally and learn globally as they increase in their understanding of the Earth and the interconnected Earth systems of atmosphere, hydrosphere , geosphere and biosphere. GLOBE students: make a core set of environmental observations at or near their schools, report their data through the Internet to a GLOBE data processing facility, receive and use global images created from worldwide GLOBE school data (see how their data "fit in" with the rest of the world data), and study environmental topics in their classrooms. GLOBE students are able to communicate through the computer with other students in other parts of the United States or the world, who like them are generating new knowledge about our planet Earth. They also have access to GLOBE scientists. An important dimension of the GLOBE project is the mentoring not only between scientists and teachers, and scientists and students, but between older students and younger students within schools or between schools. Another great feature of the GLOBE program is that it is available not just to a select few students but to whole classrooms of students and schools. Each student can actively participate , following scientific protocols for the GLOBE core set of measurements in any of the scientific disciplines: Atmosphere/climate, hydrology, land cover/biology, and soils. The excellent learning activities developed by international environmental educators can be used as introduction and/or enrichments to the measurement protocols and the research process. From the learning and monitoring activities, many lines of inquiry can easily lead into individual or classroom research projects. GLOBE is a collaboration between scientists, teachers, students, and the community. Broad International participation is integral to the design of the GLOBE Program. GLOBE international partners sign bilateral agreements with the U.S. for schools in their countries to participate in the program. In the U.S., GLOBE is administered by a Federal interagency team that includes the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Science Foundation, Environmental Protection Agency, and the Departments of Education and State, working together with over 25 state and local partner organizations.