One teacher’s dream turned into a reality when students at Sally Ride Elementary in Orange County were able to ask their burning questions to Sunita Williams, an astronaut currently at the International Space Station.
Sally Ride Elementary is famously named after the first woman in the U.S. to journey into space in 1983 on the Space Shuttle Challenger. Now, over four decades since Sally Ride’s trip to space, students are being encouraged to reach for the stars at Sally Ride elementary school.
At the ARISS, or Amateur Radio on the International Space Station Radio Contact event, 10 students, ages 7-11, were able to contact Boeing's Starliner test pilot Sunita Williams via a ham radio. Right now, Williams is docked at the International Space Station 200 miles above planet earth. The kids had 10 minutes to ask their questions.
What would you ask an astronaut?
Amelia Silson is in the fourth grade at the elementary school. She dreams of becoming an astronaut, discovering new life on other planets. And with science being her favorite subject, she prepared and crafted her questions for Williams carefully.
“The questions that I asked was, how do you train your body to go to space, and what animals have been to space,” Amelia said “Once I knew that I was gonna ask some of the questions to Sunita Williams, I went to school early each morning, and we practiced with questions and the other stuff that everybody was gonna say.”
While Amelia was on stage, her mother Ryan Silson sat in the audience watching her daughter smile as she asked her two questions. Silson said Amelia now has a little piece of space for her entire life–and so do all the students.
“To watch her so early, at 10 years old, to sort of live out such a huge part of her dream was very cool,” Silson said. “I've watched all these kids grow up too. It's the same kids that I've been seeing since kindergarten. So to watch all of them realize that as well is just even more amazing.”
The staff behind the scenes
Beatriz Berriz, the Aviation and Outer Space Magnet Program Coordinator at Sally Ride Elementary, said pulling this event off was an all-hands-on deck mission.
She got the idea for the event after someone told her that you could actually call in to the International Space Station. Once Berriz had that knowledge, she reached out to the Orlando Amateur Radio Club for help with contact and the radio club immediately accepted the mission.
‘I have to tell you that it was so hard, but I am so happy,” Berriz said. “I have the best family that supports me… I have friends, family members; everybody supported me. It made it easier, but we tried to cover many fields. We were working on telecommunication and radio communication. We were working in space learning.”
Once Sunita Williams’s voice came over the radio, Berriz was overwhelmed with joy on stage as the students walked to the microphone to ask their questions.
“I hope not too many people saw me, but I just was jumping over there,” Berriz said. “I couldn't scream because we had to remain in the perfect quiet mode, but I was so excited and jumping and screaming inside.”
The club’s vice president, John Knott, announced that they plan to donate the ham radio that allowed the school to phone Sunita Williams and help each child radio-in their question. The event was live streamed to every student at the school.
With the donation, the club plans to help create a radio station at the school and get Berriz licensed in amateur radio so the students can learn about the technology in the classroom throughout the year. In addition to that donation, Orlando’s Amateur Radio Club helped donate ARISS baseball caps to all of the magnet students
To further radio education, Knott said the club has agreed to help fund the registration for some Sally Ride Elementary teachers who want to attend the ARL teachers Institute of Wireless Technology, hosted by the American radio league in New England, Connecticut.
Knott said this event’s purpose isn’t to get a radio license, but it helps get educators excited about radio technology.
Inspiring the next generation
Kahlil Ortiz, the principal at Sally Ride Elementary, said while he could never fathom talking to an astronaut during his childhood, he is ecstatic that his students could have this opportunity at such a young age.
“I really think that's when it's going to hit them the hardest, really later in life,” Ortiz said. “While I think it's an amazing feat today, I think when they reflect on it, years from now, they're going to be like, ‘Oh, other people didn't get to do this?’ Those are the kinds of opportunities we want to provide our students. An opportunity to get that experience, and we're beating people to the punch, so we're proud.”
With over 400 students at the school and about 150 students in the magnet program, the faculty and staff make it a priority to get each student excited about learning. The assistant principal at Sally Ride Elementary, Patrick Rock, said they try to have unique events frequently.
“We live in an area where we have the Space Coast, Rock said. “We have all the things going on in the industry…and remember, they may be newscasters one day, maybe journalists. They may be writing for science corporations. There's a million different opportunities for our kids.”
Rock and Ortiz both said at the end of the day, they are both proud of their students and want to help shape whatever career path they choose.
Copyright 2024 Central Florida Public Media
