Archive for February 2019

Heads up sophomores and juniors: there’s an amazing summer program that you should apply for! It’s called STEM Enhancement in Earth Science, or SEES. It’s a free two-week internship through NASA where you work with scientists, engineers, and brilliant students from around the country to complete projects ranging from designing a CubeSat to coding programs…

Al Worden, Apollo 15 Command Module Pilot In October, the Back to Space Ambassadors had the opportunity to meet Apollo astronaut Al Worden, who is working with Back to Space to inspire our generation to pursue STEM and reach for the stars! Al Worden was born February 7, 1932 in Jackson, Michigan. Growing up, Worden…

Monday morning, 40 minutes before school starts. The hallways were silent. The classrooms were empty. The building was peaceful– except for the hall upstairs outside of the physics room. There, most of the AP Physics C students stood, chatting nervously, rehearsing presentations, pushing ball bearings onto model roller coasters and hoping they wouldn’t fall off…

Here’s the quick version: the rover was knocked out in June by a dust storm. NASA has been trying to contact it ever since. The rover exceeded expectations and lasted longer than intended. I’ve got a really funny joke to tell, ready? What do you call a rover that stops responding? Dead. Which exactly describes…

Last Tuesday I had the incredible opportunity to meet one of NASA’s most brilliant and unique engineers, Adam Steltzner. For 10 years he led a team of inventors who designed and tested the remarkable “sky crane” used to land the Curiosity rover on Mars! Just being in Mr. Steltzner’s presence was jaw-dropping enough, but what…

When does science go beyond math and logic and transform into beauty and art? Maria Mitchell was the first female astronomer in the United States and dedicated her life to learning. Mitchell was born in Nantucket, Massachusetts on August 1st, 1818. Her father helped inspire her passion for astronomy and let her use his telescope.…

He was one of the first men around the moon– one of the first to see the far side, one of the first to see the Earth rise over the stark lunar landscape, one of the first to see our home planet so small he could cover it with his thumb. He was the first…

When I first started building model airplanes, I didn’t know what I was getting into. I was fascinated by these small “toys” that you could control from the ground. YouTube further exposed me to people achieving incredible feats. People were flying hundreds of kilometers away and taking incredible footage with what seemed to be just…