Among other activities this week, participants in the geosciences department's Teacher Academy in the Natural Sciences explored the accuracy of public perceptions in reporting weather phenomena. In this exercise, Susie Wall of Starkville Academy (l), Mary McDonald of East Oktibbeha Elementary School and Joe Cargile of Madison Middle School sought to predict the size of mock "hail stones" that had "landed" a short distance away. The project concluded with comparisons between predictions and actual sizes.