LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – The Lake County Rocket Club got a big boost from Calpine employee Josh Wade when he asked his company to make a donation to the fledgling club.

Wade presented the Children’s Museum of Art and Science, the original backers of the club, with a check for $500. This money will be used for rocket kits and other supplies for next year.
 
Bill Bordisso, retired teacher and the club’s organizer, said the club had a great year.

The Rocket Club met weekly during the school year from 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. on Thursdays at the Taylor Observatory in Kelseyville.

Bordisso said the 10 students involved were in grades fourth through eighth and came from various county school districts and charter schools and also included some home schooled students.

Three or four parents usually stayed for the sessions and Bordisso said, “It was hard to tell who was the most excited – the kids or the parents.”
 
Club meetings included information on Newton’s Laws, the history of the space program, the make up of the universe, and the use of  scientific procedure. Hands-on activities were scheduled weekly to give students an opportunity, as Bordisso says, “to get dirty.”
 
Over the course of the year, club members made two rockets. For the first, all students had the same kit and they assembled them together.

For the second rocket, students got to each pick a different kit, some with enticing, descriptive names like Big Bertha, the Screaming Eagle, the Black Star Voyager and the Mean Machine (a rocket 6 feet tall). Twice the club held launches, once at Taylor and, at the end of the year, at Lower Lake Elementary.

Next year, says Bordisso, all launches will be at Taylor because the field is so much larger and it’s easier to recover the rockets after they’re launched.

“It’s heartbreaking,” says Bordisso, “When kids lose the rockets after they have spent so much time building them.”
 
Rocket Club member Jacob Stahr, a sixth grader at Terrace School, would like to pursue a career working for NASA. He loves math and is very good at it. His only complaint about the Rocket Club is that he wishes there was no summer break. He’d like to keep on building rockets all summer long.

He enjoyed building and launching the rockets as well as the other hands on activities like putting Alka Seltzer in a film canister to demonstrate Newton’s Law of equal and opposite reactions.

Overall, Jacob says, the club was “all around really, really fun” and he has been talking to two of his friends who may join him in the fall.

 
Mercedes McComb, a student at Kelseyville Elementary School, is also anxious for the club to start up again in the fall.

She said it was a “fun thing to do after school” and  though she “felt weird being the only girl in the group” she wanted other girls to know “it’s really fun and they should get involved and show boys that rockets are not just a boy thing.”
 
Mark McCombs, Mercedes’ dad, attended all sessions with his daughter and would like to encourage other parents to get involved. He said a knowledge of rocketry is not necessary. It’s the shared experience that’s important.

He and Mercedes were very proud when both of their rockets were recovered intact after the launches. He feels participation in the club has broadened his daughter’s horizons and opened new avenues of interest for her.
 
Steven Sprague, who attends Mountain Vista Middle School, is also planning to participate again next year. He built the Star Voyager and the Chrome Dome rockets and wants other kids to know that being in the Rocket Club is “a lot of fun and building rockets is a great thing to do when you are bored.”
 
Bordisso is already planning for next year’s club activities. He would like to continue to build increasingly more complex rockets and take the club members on a field trip to a NASA facility in the bay area. He is willing to increase the club membership to 20.

Parents and students in grades fourth through eighth who are interested can call him at home at 707-279-0923. Adult volunteers are always welcomed and encouraged.
 
CMAS will continue to help support this club which is free for any Lake County student. CMAS greatly appreciates the interest of community members like Josh Wade and businesses like Calpine whose donations help to defer the costs of the rocket kits and other needed supplies. Donations to support and expand the Rocket Club program are always welcomed.