As part of the International Space Station Rideshare program through MaxIQ Space, students at ILTexas College Station K-8 will send two payloads into space later this year. One, due to launch in October, will spend time on the International Space Station (ISS).

"These kids had no experience with circuitry and censors," said Amanda Krueger, Assistant Principal at College Station K-8. Krueger championed the project after learning about the opportunity from the Texas Space Grant Consortium.

The program is a multi-year process where students build data chips with sensors designed to test and measure everything from temperature to light to atmospheric gasses. One chip built by the 7th-grade team will launch on a high-altitude balloon this August in New Mexico. The second chip will head to the ISS from Florida on a SpaceX shuttle tentatively this October.

MaxIQ, Princeton University, Voyager, and NASA all partnered to make the rideshare program possible. Annually, it launches and hosts twenty student xChip payloads on the ISS for 4 to 6 weeks. Most of the participating groups are post-secondary or graduate-level Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) students.

ILTexas students working on the project hope to visit Florida for the October launch, and are currently working to organize potential travel opportunities. More information on how our community can support will be available in the coming months.