Volunteers inspire tomorrow's rocket scientists!
On May 15th, two Harvard alumni helped the City Heights Community Development Corporation (CHCDC) with their science, technology, engineering and math after-school program. CHCDC uses a curriculum designed by NASA to engage students in project based learning and stimulate their interests in the STEM fields through hands on activities.
For two hours, our alumni met with twenty-five elementary and high school students to build paper rockets and launchers. We separated the students into three teams, and then helped them read and understand the instructions to assemble the rockets from paper and the launcher from plastic pipes and two-liter soda bottles. After designing several rockets with varying levels of aerodynamic efficiency, the teams had a friendly competition to see which rockets flew the highest. We finished the night by awarding the winning team – a girls-only group of varying ages – with candy and encouragement to keep learning about different principles in science.