CEDAR FALLS, Iowa USA — A team of University of Northern Iowa computer science students are finalists in a nationwide NASA competition, called NASA Means Business 2007, which asks teams of university students to develop strategies for promoting NASA math and science programs or concepts.

“This is the first time UNI has entered a team in the competition, so we’re pretty excited to make it to the finalist round,” said team leader Robert Rivera, a senior from Waverly.

He and the other team members, juniors Chris McGee of Cedar Rapids and Manoj Balachandran of Bangalore, India, and graduate student Daniel V. Olsen of Aalborg, Denmark, will compete against six other teams at the Customer Engagement Conference at the NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida in May.

For the first round of competition in November, the UNI team submitted a storyboard for a 30-second public service announcement, a promotional print media concept and a promotional Internet concept for thier project, titled The Journey to Mars Begins Today.

Aimed primarily at grades 6-8, the UNI group’s program will give students a taste of the interesting work that can be done in math, science and computer science as well as actual experience in working as a team to build a model rocket during a one-week period, according to their advisor, Ben Schafer, UNI assistant professor of computer science.

“Building and operating the rocket will serve as a gateway to the world of practical applications of math and science,” McGee said.

Each class team will have science, math and computer science components that will work together on all aspects of the competition. The science component will build and test the model rockets, and teach basic principles of flight.

“This is to give the students some understanding of how to improve their rocket’s performance, whether by adding fins, reshaping the nose cone or shortening the rocket.”

The math component will learn several simple formulas related to rocketry, such as distance, acceleration, velocity and possibly how to calculate the distance the rocket travels, Rivera said. The computer component will learn how to modify a simple Web page, including how to display the data from pre-flght and post-flight calculations.

“The program is designed to run as a contest,” McGee said, “with the individual categories of the contest determined by the teachers. We feel that the overall experience will teach students about teamwork in a math-and-science-based environment and show a glimpse of the interesting possibilities in these fields.”

In addition to middle school students, the UNI project will also seek to communicate to the public – through newspapers, television and the Internet – why science, technology and mathematics education is important to the United States, its economy, its space program and its citizens.

In late Feb., Rivera and McGee will travel to Houston, Texas, for a two-day tour and orientation of space and exploration programs at the NASA Johnson Space Center.

At the May conference at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the teams will present their completed plans and the grand prize recipient will be announced.

In June, the winners will travel to Washington, D.C. to present their entry to senior officials at NASA headquarters.