BRAD HORN/Nevada AppealLeAnn Morris, computer teacher at Empire Elementary School, assists Guillermo Hernandez, 9, with a typing exercise during a morning class at the Carson City school on Monday.
The best thing about being an astronaut would be flying through space, and the best thing about that would be getting closer to planets, Jessica Ayala said.
"I think it would be cool to see the colors of Saturn, not just watching them in cartoons and stuff," the Empire Elementary School fourth-grader said. "I want to see how they actually look."
She could get closer this summer. Ayala is one of the Empire Elementary students who applied to go to NASA Space Camp through a school program being funded by a school concert Wednesday, where her fourth-grade music class will be one of the groups performing.
They practiced their songs about space Monday in Christina Bourne's music class.
"Have fun, guys," Bourne said, leading the class in a song about traveling to Neptune.
Several of her students have applied for the program, she said, which is important because it will help them learn to be leaders by teaching other Empire students about space.
Some, like Ayala, are excited about what they've learned about space already.
"I think it's really cool," she said.
The school program got started after LeAnn Morris, a technology teacher at Empire Elementary, went to Space Camp this summer as part of being named the 2008 state teacher of the year.
She got to give one scholarship for the camp to a student as a result, but she wanted more than one to go. Students will have a better experience if they can go with someone they know, she said, and as many students as possible should be able learn from the camp.
The cost will be around $1,3000 per student, she said.
Allan Huntington, another student who applied for the program, said he checks NASA's Web site all the time and loves reading about the mission to Mars and discoveries made in space.
"Other solar systems are cool because there might be other life there," he said.
Huntington, 9, said if he ever went to space, he would want to do experiments to see how plants would grow there and how animals would behave.
Training to go into space would be fun, said Saul Yanez, who also applied to the program, though living without gravity would be like bouncing on a trampoline.
"Yeah, you could do cartwheels and backflips," he said.
- Contact reporter Dave Frank at dfrank@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1212.