Nestled against the backdrop of the Caribou-Targhee National Forest in southeast Idaho is the small town of Bancroft. Back in November, the Idaho Lottery delivered a Classroom Wishlist project to Alex Sandoval’s 5th grade classroom at North Gem School in Bancroft. For their science curriculum, the students were going to study space. As their project, each student was going to build a working rocket to launch in the spring.

On a partly cloudy spring afternoon in May, Mrs. Sandoval’s class was ready for her students to make their rocket’s maiden voyages and launch them into the sky.

“These rockets are capable of reaching 1,900 to 2,000 feet into the sky,” said Mrs. Sandoval. “We had to postpone the launch a day because of high winds aloft. We were worried about where the rockets would end up!”

Her students echoed her sentiments. “Besides how to build a rocket, we’ve learned about practice, patience, and perseverance, especially in launching our rockets,” said one of her students before the flights.

“We also learned about Jose Hernandez whose childhood dream was to become a NASA astronaut and applied twelve times before being accepted into their training program,” said another student.

When asked who was going to be the next astronaut from the class, one young boy replied, “Astronaut? I don’t want to be an astronaut. I want to be a cowboy!”

When this student was asked if they w

ould need cowboys in space, he thought for a minute, then revised his original statement: “Space Cowboys?! I could be the first!”

Moments later in the spring sunshine, the class successfully launched all their rockets, many of which were named “Wizard” or the classic “Saturn V”.

Here is wishing Mrs. Sandoval’s class fair skies, calm winds, and safe flights!