Send the Sporeos to the Launch

A team of students at IPrep in Buffalo, NY has won the Student Spaceflight Experiment Project and will be sending their experiment to the International Space Station.  As part of this program, we will be taking the winning team to the Kennedy Space Center to watch the launch in Spring/Summer 2019 and to Washington, DC for the SSEP Conference to present their findings in the Spring of 2020.   In addition to seeing the launch, we will be providing a unique experience with a trip to Walt Disney World and Universal Studios.  For each trip, we have budgeted for our 4 students, 2 teachers (one female, one male) and 1 administrator.  This includes food, lodging, transportation, etc. Our students come from a lower socioeconomic area and travel isn't really something they get the opportunity to do.  This project took a lot of work, 3 hours a day typing/ researching after school without a grade as a reward.  The students did it because they found the work in itself rewarding.  We believe students like this need to be sent a message that hard work does pay off.  If we were a suburban school, much of this financial burden would fall on the parents.  However, this isn't something that is viable for us and our students.  This honor should not go by the wayside because of where the student was born.  Instead, let's reward these students for focusing on the right things and achieving.