YOU ARE INVITED - Two Central Oklahoma StellarXplorers Teams Reach Finals!
The StellarXplorers Program Office of the Air Force Association cordially invites you to “attend” ("listen into") the Opening and Awards Ceremonies for the (virtual) National Finals of StellarXplorers VII.
The Finals are the culminating event of the season. The ten Finalist teams hail from five states across the US: CA, MA, NC, OK, and OR. These teams have emerged from an original field of 211 teams by demonstrating excellent performance through three rounds of qualification competition and a semi-final round. During the Finals, conducted on Friday, 16 April, and Saturday morning, 17 April, the teams will be faced with a rigorous test of designing orbits, selecting spacecraft components, and designating a launch vehicle to meet a specific mission scenario with associated technical and programmatic constraints. They will then present their solution and the process they used to a panel of expert judges.
This invitation serves as a “save the date.” The Opening Ceremony will begin 1730 EDT, Thursday, 15 April; the Awards Ceremony at 1700 EDT on Saturday. Both presentations of about an hour each will be broadcast via the StellarXplorers channel on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChLxf8Dj9-449HWHQAxYegg). Each presentation will appear in the right column of this page, once it is uploaded to YouTube. When the video of each respective ceremony is uploaded and thereby a specific site address established, we will provide that citation, too.
The Finalists are an extraordinary group of talented high school students, representing the future of the critical, technical base in the United States. Please reserve a couple of hours to help us recognize and celebrate their success.
We at the Central Oklahoma Air Force Association would like to congratulate our teams from Oklahoma competing in the virtual StellarXplorers National Finals on 15-17 April 2021.
Pathfinders to the Stars from Edmond North High School get their name from the 22d Space Operations Squadron at Schriever AFB that is currently part of the newly created Space Force and the Purple Ducks from Francis Tuttle (Portland Campus) will be competing to become the StellarXplorer National Champion against eight other teams from California, Oregon, North Carolina and Massachusetts. StellarXplorer is a very challenging space system design competition involving all aspects of system development and operation with a focus on spacecraft and payloads. For more information, visit StellarXplorers.
Pictured on left: Pathfinders to the Stars from Edmond North High School - Front Row (L - R): Keean Moise, Logan Kihara, Alex Loney (Team Captain), Michael Gaona and Ethan Ran. Second Row (L-R): ENHS Support Team: - SMSgt (ret) Roy Martos, Maj (ret) Eric Weingaertner, CMSgt (ret) Corey Bowen, Mr. Ernie Sanchez (Team Coach) and Ms. Debreon Davis (ENHS Principal).
Pictured on right: (L-R): Purple Ducks from Francis Tuttle - Bryan Kitzrow (Mentor), Sean Rice, Renardus Herholdt, Samual Doerflinger (Team Captain), Clark Howard, and Charles Koutahi (Team Director)
In the words of Charles Koutahi, Francis Tuttle Purple Ducks Team Director:
“Everyone, young or old, has imagined being in outer space. Space is full of mystery, but the StellarXplorers program helps students form realistic expectations of what it would be like to explore space. Knowledge and understanding of space, and the relevance of space studies, increase every year. StellarXplorers gives students the means to grow their knowledge and soft skills, leading to the real possibility of a career in the space industry. Teamwork, conflict resolution, communication, and time management, combine with technical and academic skills, to give students the confidence that they can tackle new and seemingly impossible design challenges.”