Team America Rocket Challenge 2009

The Team America Rocketry Challenge is a national rocketry contest open to 7th through 12th grade students who must enter as teams of up to ten to design, build and fly a rocket that meets a pre-defined mission objective. Teams can be sponsored by schools or by non-profit youth organizations such as Scouts, 4-H, or Civil Air Patrol (but not the NAR or other rocketry organizations). This year's challenge is to design, build and fly a model rocket carrying one raw grade A large egg sitting sideways in the rocket and return it safely to the ground while staying aloft for exactly 45 seconds and reaching an altitude of 750 feet.

See the NAR and AIA websites for the contest rules.

LUNAR is honored to support the TARC qualification launches again this year. TARC teams are welcome to participate in the regularly scheduled club launches. The launch fees are waived for all TARC teams. As the deadline approaches in April, special TARC are scheduled at Nasa Ames:

David Raimondi, TARC Launch Coordinator
d.raimondi@sbcglobal.net, 408.997.2571 (h) or 408.742.5173 (w)

 

Central California TARC Team Mentor Volunteers:

A complete list of mentors can be found at the NAR website.

Central California TARC Team Peer Mentor Volunteers:

Special TARC Launch Schedule

Funding

The following is from Trip Barber at NAR concerning funding sources for TARC teams.

I know that money is a significant impediment to many groups of students who are interested in participating in TARC. While the entry fee is "only" $105, there are the added costs of altimeter, software, rocket parts, and motors. You can help by guiding teams toward the vendors listed in the TARC Handbook who are making the extra effort to provide component parts for TARC teams at good prices, and by providing access to launch pads and other support equipment that the teams would otherwise have to build or buy. But in the end we estimate that it probably takes on the average about $500 to have a team start from scratch and reach the skill level to be competitive for selection to attend the Finals. There are not established corporate sponsors that we can direct toward teams at the national level, although at the local level a number of aerospace companies (and local businesses) do support teams in the area of their plants or offices. There are, however, two grant programs that sponsoring teachers can apply for, within certain conditions and limitations, for activities associated with aerospace education. TARC teams certainly are the kind of program that may qualify, and some teams' teachers have used each of these programs in the past.

Air Force Association Educator Grant Program (accepting applications until Novmber 14) (up to $250): http://www.afa.org/aef/aid/educator.asp

American Institute of Aeronautics And Astronautics K-12 Classroom Educator Grants (up to $200): http://www.aiaa.org/content.cfm?pageid=216

Of course, the NAR has our outstanding Robert L. Cannon Educator Grant program (up to $500), http://www.nar.org/pdf/cannon.pdf but this program has a May 1 deadline for applying for grants that are then awarded at NARAM, so only those teachers who applied for such grants last year will have the funds this year while TARC 2009 is going on.

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