Posted 3/11/2004 04:53:00 PM by Douglas

It's good to see where CCISD is using some of their (read: my) money: Training high school students to be machinists.

LAGUE[sic] CITY - Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 8 astronauts are conducting 19 science experiments. Some 220 miles below, inside the metal shop at Clear Creek High School, students are building and assembling 30 custom- designed lockers made to hold similar experiments.

Forty-five Clear Creek students grouped into teams of seven to 10 members are participating in the HUNCH project, an initiative coordinated by engineers at JSC and the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

HUNCH stands for High School Students United with NASA to Create Hardware.

It's good to see that they carry on the rich NASA tradition of coming up with stupid acronyms. But is this the image of CCISD they want to project? A glorified trade school? They got a quarter Billion dollars for bonds and they're producing sheet metal workers?

Tim Bourn, 16, said touring the space station ground support facilities at JSC at the beginning of the project, seeing what the products he's manufacturing are supposed to look like and what they will be used for was a jaw-dropping experience.

"Manufacturing parts for NASA is pretty cool," Bourn said. "You can put in your résumé that you worked for NASA in high school."

That's just great, Tim, but NASA and its contractors already have machinists to build space hardware. What do you think they were doing while you were playing around in shop class?