On April 8th, the Rosenblum Integration of Biology, English and Technology (IBET) classes visited the companion facility to the National Air and Space Museum the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center located in Chantilly.  Students first browsed through the museum, where they perused the exhibits, rode the simulators and visited the gift shop.  Students also listened to a presentation and participated in a rocket building activity.

The rocket building activity involved groups of five students each.  Everyone was assigned a different role in the group, ranging from mission heads to scientific instruments manager.  All groups were given a budget and 25 minutes to complete the project.  The main challenge was to balance the power that was consumed and the weight of the rocket with the amount of scientific return points that were generated, in addition to staying on budget.

“The activity in the room was pretty fun because they added competition and it was not boring like I thought it was going to be,” freshman Megan Wan said.

Teachers Lona Klein, Michael Piccione and Jennifer Rosenblum attended the field trip, along with guidance counselor Sean Burke.

“I was impressed by how easily and efficiently the students in my IBET worked in teams to solve the Mars mission issue,” Klein said. “I felt like they couldn’t do that as well at the beginning of the year as they could at the end because we have such a strong IBET program that builds that kind of camaraderie.  It was a cool activity but, for me personally, what made it great was seeing everyone put their heads together and then quickly coming up with a solution and having a good time.”

Many of the students found the field trip to be equally fun and educational.

“The field trip was a great educational experience which I think we benefited from a lot,” freshman Aashish Batheja said. “The mission to Mars activity was very enjoyable, especially the game at the end.  We really had to work as a group.  I think we should have more field trips like this in the future.”