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Has anyone participated in the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP), developed by the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE)?

Our school of approximately 840 students will be participating in the SSEP-Mission 3, where in the next few weeks, students will write a science proposal and one from the Hilo-Waiakea area will be selected to fly to the International Space Station where it will be conducted. Students throughout the complex can also complete in a design competition for a mission patch to fly with the selected project into space. We are the first in Hawaii to participate in this program and I was wondering if there were any teachers who have participated in this program before and could give me some tips or feedback? While we are very excited to be participating, given the cost and magnitude of this opportunity, as the time nears for students to write their proposals, teachers are starting to feel a bit overwhelmed. Suggestions?

For more information about the SSEP, go to http://ssep.ncesse.org/

Wow! That a really interesting project for your school to become a part of. What grade are your students? I teach fourth grade and would have to do a lot of prep work with them before we could do that. I would pick and choose different items from that website. I can see the students must be excited about this because it's applying real world situations to what they are doing in school. Thanks for sharing, Helen

We are a middle school (6-8). 4th graders are not able to participate in the submission of proposals :(5+), but they can participate in the patch design competition. Thank you for your post of interest and encouragement. I'm the science DH at my school and part of the dept., is kind of like, "What have you gotten us into?"

I don't know if this would help in any way, but the NASA website may have some ideas for you and your students just to get started. We were a NASA school a couple of years ago and were guided through the website. The amount of materails available may just spark some imagination. Hope it helps.

Hmmmm The Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) sounds ... pretty cool! http://ssep.ncesse.org Wonder how I can find out if my community can come aboard SSEP Mission 4 to the International Space Station? I hear that Mission 4 is to be announced across the U.S. in October 2012, for an experiment design competition in Spring 2013 and a flight of each participating community's selected flight experiment to Station in Fall 2013. Why ... maybe I should call the Center Director of the National Center for Earth and Space Science Education, and Director of SSEP. Sure! what's that number again?? 301-395-0770 ps- SSEP is not for an individual class of students. Each participating community needs to fully immerse a minimum of 300 grade 5-12 students in real microgravity experiment design and proposal writing, with typically 50-60 real experiment proposals written by their student teams. One experiment will be selected for flight to ISS after a 2-step review process. AUTHENTIC SCIENCE FOR AUTHENTIC SCIENCE EDUCATION <- I like that! Jeff Goldstein

Thank you Dr. Goldstein, for your PA post and teleconference on Tuesday, you have a real gift with words and really helped to inspire the teachers and put their minds at ease. I liked your emphasis on this being students' questions and their proposals as I think sometimes adults lose site of this. I also think that as a society, we stifle kids constant questioning or are so quick to supply them with an answer and it being the right answer at that, we deprive of them of an amazing "journey." Thanks again for this awesome opportunity.

Tabitha- I'm really glad the kick off teleconference went well:) Am really excited that SSEP is on the Big Island! The Hilo Complex is now part of America's Space Program.