Challenger Center

Ever since I was a little kid my parents, teachers, and friends have asked me what I want to be when I grow up. I answered all the usual: “Policewoman,” “Fireperson,” “Paleontologist,” “Archeologist.” I must have changed careers monthly based on what I was studying in school or what the coolest person on my favorite television show did. As we studied more in school and I got older my interests began to narrow some – I was only changing yearly or less. At the beginning of my 6th grade year I had wanted to be nothing but a professional soccer player for the last 2 years. Everything I did and read had to do with soccer. People would tell me that “so few athletes make it to the top” but I did not care. I wanted that more than anything.

Every year the sixth grade class at my elementary school went on a fun, un-educational field trip near the end of the year to celebrate our completion of elementary school. Due to a last minute over-run of Poison Ivy we had to cancel our trip to Hemlock (a recreational camp) where we were going to use the zip-line. My friends and I were very upset about this because every other sixth grade class had come back bragging about what a wonderful time they had had. The teachers worked quickly to find an alternate field trip for us that would be new and exciting – living so close to DC we had all been to the museums a thousand times so the easy and obvious choices were out.

Even though the Hemlock trip was out there was much excitement buzzing around about what great and exciting field trip we would go on – the teachers had been telling us for days that what they had planned was going to be just as fun if not better. Well finally a few weeks before the trip they passed out permission forms and parent information. I, along with everyone else, quickly looked at the top of form to see where we were going, “Challenger Center.” None of us had ever heard of it but interests were piqued slightly, it sounded exciting, but many were still disappointed about not being able to go on the zip-line.

A few days before the field trip our teachers split us into groups of four students and handed out some general information. We were going to simulate a space mission to somewhere (to be determined when we got to the Center). My teacher came over to each group and told them what their job was going to be for the duration of our mission. He walked up to my group, told us we were going to be Navigation and handed us some more information and nametags. We were told to split ourselves into groups of two and one set of us was to be mission control and the other to be the crew. My partner and I decided we would be ground control. When then got to design our own name tags with our teams job and a one or two depending if we were control or crew. We then sat and talked about the information that was passed out to us about our job as the navigation team. The excitement level was rising but there was still a little disappointment at having to do something even remotely educational.

The day of the field trip came and everyone was insanely excited as they were before every field trip. We piled into the bus and drove the 35 minutes to the Challenge Center in DC. We walked into the corner building and sat down in our teams in chairs in what they called the “briefing room” (which also served as the de-briefing room). Two women in blue NASA flight suits walked in and told us that we were going to go on a mission to Mars. She asked if we knew our jobs and our partners and told us that all we had to do was follow what was in our Mission Plan and on the computer screens and everything would work out okay. She also told us to be prepared for “unexpected problems” such as an “emergency” need for the crew to release static charge on metal poles in the space shuttle.

We went to our stations and sat down, Navigation was right in front. We put on headsets so that we could communicate to our team on the crew. We opened to the first page in our binder and began to follow the directions of what to do and dealt with any problems that occurred. It was our job to get us to Mars and find a safe landing route so as not to crash into any volcanoes or craters. We successfully landed on Mars and one of the women told us that it was time to switch the crew and the mission control people for the trip back.

We followed the woman into a room that was set up like a transporter pad from Star Trek. She talked us through the “beaming” process and we walked through a door into the spacecraft pretending we had been “beamed” on board. We sat down out our stations and had to work quickly because a dust storm was coming and if we did not successfully get off the planet in 12 minutes we would fail the mission (and, yes, that WAS able to happen – it was made to be a realistic simulation). All the teams worked quickly to be able to lift-off the planet and to fix any of the surprise problems that occurred within their system. Part of the navigation team’s objectives was to check all 7 of the cameras to make sure it was clear for lift-off. The rear camera would not work and there was nothing in the plans for fixing that problem (it was unplanned in a VERY real sense – Just goes to show that things really can go wrong.) Luckily lift off was possible without that camera and we made it off the planet with two minutes to spare. The rest of the mission down was uneventful and we were all buzzing with pure excitement as we entered the now “de-briefing” room.

We sat across from our other team’s pair and the two women again began talking about the mission and congratulating us own our successful mission to Mars and back. One of the women began calling each team to stand up and telling why what they did was important. “Navigation,” pause, “without them we would not have made to Mars and back.” At that moment I knew I had to have that - had to work for NASA at least in mission control as a navigational specialist.

Following this trip an interest in space naturally followed and following that an interest in astronomy. Now instead of soccer my life is filled with space, science, math, and astronomy. My interests have led me to want to be an astronaut and to go into space. Being in navigation is no longer that important as long as I am doing something that will help further science and is important to the mission at hand. If you ask me what I want to do when I grow up I answer, “To be the first person to walk on Mars.” That seems as wishful as a little kid who wants to be a professional soccer player, and it is. They are not asking the correct question, I want to be the first person to walk on Mars but I am going to be an astronaut. The two are mutually exclusive and the latter will not change and is not wishful thinking. The feeling is very different from that of the little kid feeling of wanting to be a policewoman or fireperson. Anyone who knows what they are going to knows the difference I am talking about.

It is kind of sad how the that lady in that NASA flight suit will never know how she changed my life by saying that one sentence about navigation, “Without them we would not have made it to Mars and back.”

It is amazing how an overgrowth of Poison Ivy can change your life for the better.