Mt. Tahoma High School student Oliver Rozon has been selected as a Washington Aerospace Scholar for 2009. He is among 260 talented juniors from across the state accepted into the first phase of Washington Aerospace Scholars (WAS).
These 260 students are currently participating in Phase One of WAS: distance learning with a NASA-designed curriculum covering the history of space exploration, the Space Shuttle, the International Space Station, the Moon and Mars. From January through May, the Scholars will complete 10 lessons, submitting quizzes, math solutions, essays and graphics concerning these topics every other week. Scholars will independently select a topic of interest for a final project combining an essay with a graphic. Scholars are also competing for a space in one of our four summer residency sessions.
Phase Two of WAS is a six-day summer residency experience for 160 students. Selection is competitive and centers around performance in Phase One of WAS. In each residency session, 40 Scholars are selected to work cooperatively to plan a human mission to Mars with support from professional engineers/scientists, university students and certificated educators.
Each session also includes briefings from aerospace professionals, tours of engineering facilities, and hands-on engineering challenges involving model rocketry, robotics, landing devices and payload lofting. The daily schedule is quite full, and the students lodge in double rooms at a local hotel under the supervision of certificated teachers. Travel, lodging and meal expenses are provided to participating students and teachers thanks to the WAS Foundation and many generous donors.
Contact Melissa Edwards, WAS administrator, Museum of Flight, at 206.764.5866 for more information or check the Web site at www.museumofflight.org/washingtonaerospacescholars.
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