Calhoun High is very excited to announce that two of its juniors and two of its seniors will attend the summer 2008 NASA INSPIRE internship at the Kennedy Space Center. With four placements in the program, CHS has the largest Georgia contingent in this exclusive program. Our NASA region also includes Florida and Puerto Rico. From the class of 2008, Zach Budzius and Liz Chang will represent Calhoun and our juniors include Cody Franks and Rachel Jude. 
     INSPIRE is a newly-funded NASA effort to encourage students and their parents to consider academic majors and related work in the area of STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Mathematics). Eventually, INSPIRE will include rising juniors in an online community which will feature remote broadcasts from scientific experts from NASA's ten major US research stations. 
     Zach and Liz will receive a $5,000 stipend and have the opportunity to live in a communal residential community with other rising college freshmen. Rachel and Cody will live in a supervised dorm setting and receive nearly $2,000 in compensation for their eight weeks of labor. The two rising seniors will have residential staff who are veteran K-12 educators and will schedule several weekend jaunts around Florida. 
     INSPIRE seeks to open the inner doors of NASA's world-class research to upper division high school students; many of the targeted students will be offered later opportunities to mentor younger students in their hometowns and present research summaries at scientific conferences. CHS principal Wanda Westmoreland is thrilled that this quartet of students will have such an eye-opening summer research experience.