Area elementary student chosen as a national winner of Reach for the Stars Rocket Competition

  • Published
  • By Deidre Ortiz
  • AEDC/PA
ARNOLD AIR FORCE BASE, TENN. --  Samuel Mansfield, fifth grade student at Robert E. Lee Elementary and son of GP Strategies engineer James Mansfield, won the local Reach for the Stars Rocket Competition last year and was recently selected as a winner at the national level.

Samuel is one of four students that will be recognized as a Reach for the Stars national winner and be part of a special celebration April 16 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. While there, Samuel will be able to tour the Astronaut Hall of Fame and have the opportunity to launch his winning rocket. He will also receive a Space Shuttle Challenger commemorative medal signed by Challenger pilot Astronaut Jon McBride.

The Reach for the Stars National Rocket Competition is an educational outreach program giving young students the opportunity to build and launch their own solid-fuel powered rocket. Each entry receives a complete rocket kit to build, launch and keep.
The program was co-founded in 2005 by former science teachers Jack and Kathy Colpas. Their goal is to inspire an interest in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math subjects and to celebrate the first teacher in space, Christa McAuliffe, of NASA's Space Shuttle Challenger.

James Mansfield said his son has always been interested in taking apart and building things and mentioned that over Christmas break he put together a motorized LEGO® Crawler Crane and LEGO Service Truck in only three days.

"Even at an early age Samuel has had an eye for different things," he said. "As just a toddler, he would often ask for things such as hoses and ropes for his birthday instead of toys. In fact, he never misses an opportunity to take something apart that is being discarded in order to see how it works. He's taken apart old washing machines, microwaves and vacuum cleaners.

"The funny thing is that he still carries a spool of rope to baseball practice in case he needs to climb a tree or tie something up."

Mansfield mentioned that in addition to baseball and archery, Samuel's year has been full of STEM activities. He was a member of the FIRST® LEGO League team at East Lincoln Elementary School, as well as a participant in the Reach for the Stars competition, hosted in August 2015 by the AEDC STEM Program and the local chapter of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics at the University of Tennessee Space Institute.

"This was a really fun day for the students who had the opportunity to build rockets and launch them," Mansfield said.

Because it has been several months since the local Reach for the Stars competition, the Mansfield family was surprised and ecstatic to hear the news of Samuel's national win.

"You can imagine our surprise when we received a congratulatory email saying he was a national winner and he would get to launch a rocket from Cape Canaveral," Mansfield said. "When I told Samuel, his response was 'cool!'"

Before heading to Kennedy Space Center, Samuel will also be congratulated by AEDC Commander Col. Rodney Todaro during a recognition ceremony April 13 at AEDC. 

-AEDC-