Educators, students and groups will gain better access to NASA expertise and missions as plans progress for the Educator Resource Center at NASA Wallops Flight Facility on the Eastern Shore.

Officials plan to break ground Monday afternoon on the new $547,000 center, which NASA says will be located next to its Visitor Center on Route 175. The building is expected to be finished by next summer.

Once completed, NASA says the center will offer workshops and presentations on NASA and Wallops missions to teachers, home-school teachers, Scout and church group leaders and others. The goal is to help engage more young people in space exploration, as well as the STEM disciplines of science, technology, engineering and math.

"The new Educator Resource Center will increase the number of opportunities for regional educators and their students to engage with NASA and its missions," Joyce L. Winterton said in a release. Winterton is senior adviser for education and leadership development at Wallops.

According to NASA Wallops spokesman Jeremy Eggers, they expect to reach educators locally, regionally and nationally through face-to-face interaction and digital communications.

Wallops has long sought to engage teachers and students, and in fiscal year 2014 its professional development programs reached 87 educators from 11 states, according to NASA. Those educators then reached some 6,900 students.

About 800 students participated in education opportunities at Wallops, including the Virginia Space Coast Scholars, the Robotics Alliance and NASA's Science Mission Directorate's Undergraduate Student Instrument Project, NASA says. And 32 high school and college students participated in summer internships.

NASA Wallops Flight Facility was established in 1945 for national aeronautics research, and since then has launched thousands of rockets.

Every year it continues to launch 20 to 30 research rockets and 15 to 20 scientific balloons. It's also the site of the state-owned Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport, where Dulles-based Orbital Sciences Corp. launches commercial resupply cargo missions to the International Space Station.

Dietrich can be reached by phone at 757-247-7892.

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NASA Wallops to break ground on new educator center