The end of Term 1 saw 10 of our Year 12 students join in with 22 students from Cashmere High School, Unlimited, Otago Boys High School and Logan Park High School, on a 19 day adventure to America.

The trip saw the students visit Dallas, Texas for 24 hours before travelling on to Huntsville, Alabama and the Davidson Space and Research Centre, which was to be their home for the week while they undertook training at Space Camp. During the week, students participated in group activities involving the design of rockets, lunar rovers and heat shields for astronauts, they got to experience 3 G forces and anti-gravity simulation through learning to scuba dive, and undertook training missions in life-sized space module replicas for missions to Mars, amongst other team building and flight simulator activities. At the end of the week the teams graduated from Space Camp and then the group flew across to Orlando, Florida. 

During the second week, students visited Gatorland, went on zip lines, eco tours and kayaking trips. They spent two days with the Disneyland School, learning the physics of roller coasters and how light and sound waves create the magic behind the scenes and, of course, then experiencing the theme park's rides. They also spent time visiting Dr Philips High School and spent the morning following a buddy to their classes to experience what education was like in America. To complete the astronomical theme, a day was also spent visiting Kennedy Space Centre and included lunch with an astronaut. Each one of our students showed maturity beyond their years. I felt very privileged to be their teacher and hopefully they have taken home amazing memories from all these different experiences.