Area students return from space ... camp

When Space Camp attendee and member of Team Andromeda Ethan Moser returned home, his parents asked what was his favorite part of the weeklong camp in Huntsville, Alabama.

His response was a no-brainer.

“I said, ‘Everything,’” Moser joked.

Moser was one of 17 students from the Forest Lake area who graduated from Space Camp and Space Academy on Friday, May 17, and he wasn’t the only one who thought it was an out-of-this-world trip.

For student and Team Andromeda member Evalynn Elmquist, she rated the trip a 10-out-of-10 when she returned home to her parents after spending a week training like a NASA astronaut.

One of her favorite experiences was the Multi-Axis Trainer, a simulation that NASA astronauts used to simulate the feelings that might be encountered in space.

Space Camp, for kids 9-11, is a program put on by NASA and the U.S. Space and Rocket Center where students get the opportunity to train in simulators, gravity chairs and launch missions to the International Space Station. Elmquist and Moser participated in Space Camp on Team Andromeda.

The older students ages 12 to 14 participated in Space Academy, where they worked as a team to complete similar tasks and challenges throughout the week on Team Luna, which area student Bizzie Schenz was a part of.

Each team conducted missions from “Mission Control,” a dimly lit space full of screens and desks, to ensure a mission is carried out safely. Each team member followed a script of work and things to say to ensure the mission was carried out.

Schenz was in charge of Mission Control for their scripted mission. If Schenz noticed someone was off script, she had to correct them to ensure the team stayed on track. And while everything was to the book, curveballs were thrown at them.

“Whenever there was the anomaly, and we had to make a decision about how to fix it, I had to [find the solution],” Schenz said.

Even though Space Camp adequately pushed the students to learn and step outside of their comfort zones to participate in the immersive experience, the hardest moment was after the weeklong trip.

“One of the hardest parts was coming back and having a week’s worth of late assignments,” Schenz joked.

For Moser, there was an activity where his team had to construct a cube frame in the Underwater Astronaut Trainer. Putting the cube together wasn’t the hard part — it was being unable to talk to his teammates to lift it out of the 20-foot deep pool.

“There was like a solar flare, so we couldn’t talk, so we had to bring it all the way to the other side, trying to get it on top (of the pool), and then we could finally talk,” Moser explained, adding his team worked well together so it wasn’t too hard to maneuver.

When students arrive at Space Camp, all the details of missions or exercises, like the one Team Andromeda completed, are well thought out — including the sleeping quarters, which have no windows to further simulate what it could be like to travel through dimly lit space.

However, that didn’t faze any of them, since their days were packed from sunrise to sunset.

“We had like 30 minutes to get ready and then we went to breakfast, and then just did different things [all day],” Schenz said.

Since they spent minimal time inside their rooms, it wasn’t weird to have no window for the week.

Each week of the program, all the students who attend draw a patch, and at the end of the week, one patch is selected to commemorate the weeklong experience. Moser’s patch was selected as the one to represent the week for all student attendees.

“I just had the idea of doing Roman numerals with rockets as the [numerals],” Moser said.

Linwood Elementary Principal Gretchen Mattson spearheaded the program’s inaugural year and hoped to turn his design into a pin or patch to commemorate the first trip for Forest Lake area students.

Schenz even mentioned how some of the people in her group, herself included, would be interested in going back to the program as high schoolers for Advanced Space Academy for students 15 to 18. Leading up to her trip to Space Academy, she knew she wanted to work for NASA in the future and this only reinforced that goal, she said.

Forest Lake Community Education’s Space Camp model required parents to be involved and ensure funds were raised to support all the students going to Alabama for a week. For them, it became an opportunity to connect with other parents through this project.

“It was enjoyable just meeting everybody and just seeing all the different schools kind of come together, and it was new to us, and we really enjoyed it,” said Tim Elmquist, Evalynn’s father.

They were proud of the work they were able to accomplish and the support of the community at large who attended their fundraising events or simply donated.

“A strong experience for me was movie night. When I feel like every parent and all the kids were there for that to support us, and it made it just all the easier,” said Evalynn’s mother, Heidi Elmquist.

She was originally a bit apprehensive of how the Science Saturday sessions would work for the parents of the students, but was pleasantly surprised at how collaborative and open everyone was to the experience.

Bizzie’s mother, Kim Schenz, thought the work all the students put in on Saturday mornings leading up to leaving for Space Camp was a testament to how eager and excited they were to participate.

“This was all extra, in addition to all their schoolwork and sports and music and all the other things that they do. This is an extra thing that they had to do. And they all really showed up for it,” Kim said.

Next year during the first week of May, Community Education hopes to bring 30 students to Huntsville, Alabama, to participate in Space Camp or Space Academy. Applications will open around the start of the 2024-2025 school year.

More information and photos from this year’s trip can be found online at facebook.com/groups/rangerspacecamp2024/.