The eight girls comprising three teams from Frontier High School currently in Houston, Texas, for the annual NASA HUNCH (High Schools United with NASA to Create Hardware) competition will be extending their trip.
The Frontier teams have been selected to be in the studio audience in Manhattan for a CBS Mornings live town hall segment on Friday (May 1) with the Artemis II crew that circled the moon earlier this month. The segment is currently scheduled to start at 7:30 a.m. on CBS (locally on WIVB) and streaming on Paramount.
Co-host Gayle King and CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil will moderate the town hall – titled “CBS Mornings Presents: Artemis II A Celebration of Heroes” – with the astronauts from the historic mission: Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen.
In addition to Frontier, two schools in Manhattan – NEST+m and M.S. 255 Salk School of Science – and Bergen County Technical High School in New Jersey were selected to participate.
Students submit questions to the astronauts ahead of time, and if chosen, get the chance to ask their questions on air. Others expected to be featured will be director Ron Howard, Bill Nye the Science Guy and Jack, the 8-year-old aspiring astronaut who was interviewed by CBS News during coverage of the Artemis launch.
The Frontier students flew into Houston on Monday (April 27). They presented their research Tuesday (April 28) and Wednesday (April 29). They were originally scheduled to fly back to Buffalo on Thursday (April 30) but will now head straight for New York City and arrive back in Buffalo on Friday (May 1).
All three teams in Houston for the competition are in the health and sciences category and are advised by Science Teacher Dr. Michael Delmont.
“I'm really proud of them. These girls all put in an incredible amount of work over the course of the year, and I’ve been thoroughly impressed with them all,” Dr. Delmont said.
“It’s great to see them recognized for their achievements. They’re genuinely all great kids – the kind that make teachers really enjoy their jobs,” Dr. Delmont added.
There are two seniors – Julianna Boncore and Alisha Izzy – and six juniors – Emily Bella, Caitlin Grieser, Gianna Conti, Ava Lavelle, Lizzy Gannon and Reagan Healy – representing Frontier in the competition.
NASA describes HUNCH as a nationally recognized workforce development program with a 24-year legacy of preparing the next generation of innovators and leaders. Through immersive project-based learning, high school students gain hands-on experience by designing and fabricating real-world products that are valued and utilized by NASA engineers and astronauts.