In my last post I shared about an opportunity that I had to explore Antartica, South Georgia, and Patagonia. However, due to unforeseen circumstances that affected my health, I was not able to travel on that EPIC adventure.
Though heartbreaking, sometimes, challenges that present themselves in our path, serve as reminders to focus on what really matters.
What matters most to me as an educator is to fuel curiosity and provide opportunities for exploration.
I am now shifting our focus from exploring Antartica to exploring the edge of space with my students. Yes, you read right!
Thanks to an organization called STRATOSTAR and the support of the school that I am teaching at, St. Stephan's Episcopal Day School, students from grades 3-5 from our school and a few other students from neighboring schools will be launching experiments to 100,000ft above the surface of the earth in a payload, attached to a WEATHER BALLOON!
I first came across this experiment at Space Center Houston with my colleagues from Space Exploration Educator Crew.
Educators from around the country are collaborating to prepare students for 21st century science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers through Space Center Houston’s Space Exploration Educator Crew.
When I participated in the launch, I realized that it was something that I HAD TO DO WITH MY STUDENTS...This year, the STARS ALIGNED!
Why are we performing High Altitude Weather Balloon Experiments with our students? It's
simple. AUTHENTIC RESEARCH EXPERIENCES have the power to ignite passion.
Read about why NASA is doing High Altitude Weather Balloon Experiments
With Stratostar, we will be able to track our mission pre, during, and post launch.
This is our MISSION LINK + Follow the hashtag on #STRATOSTAR0637 to learn more about our mission as well.
Our launch kit has already arrived at school.
Here is a video example of what we will be working on:
NOW THE REAL WORK BEGINS. We need to figure out what we will launch and WHY. The next few weeks we will be gathering general understanding of different concepts related to the experiment and then we will take a deeper dive into the experiments we choose to investigate.
We will share about our 🧪 experiment, research, challenges, launch , recovery, and lessons learned 🚀 as we grow through this process. If you or your school is interested in submitting research ideas, learning more about our project, partnering up with our students, or sponsoring student experiments, please message me!
T-77 days until we LAUNCH