Students Visit MITRE's Aviation Center for Hands-On Experience in Aviation and Cutting-Edge Technology

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

McLean, Virginia, August 16, 2001 — Ninth grade students from Prince William County, Virginia, and East Chicago, Indiana, recently visited The MITRE Corporation and its Center for Advanced Aviation System Development (CAASD) in McLean to be introduced to aviation and related technologies. The visit was part of the "Reach For Tomorrow" (RFT) program, a non-profit organization created to inspire "at-risk" students who show potential to do better work. A collaborative effort between MITRE and Virginia's Hampton University, this summer's RFT event was designed to increase students' exposure to opportunities for higher education and encourage them to set goals and work toward them.

MITRE/CAASD engineer and volunteer coordinator for this year's RFT summer program, Dennis Rowe, says he became involved in Reach for Tomorrow because he thought the program could actually make a difference. "It can help the students prepare for college and their future careers...and it shows them why it's important to take math and science courses now," he says. Recent Hampton graduate Stephanie Henderson, who also works for MITRE/CAASD in the Business Resource Center, served as one of the chaperones for the students once they left MITRE for Hampton University.

While at MITRE, the students tested out a flight simulator, participated in an aviation careers panel discussion and in software demos with MITRE-developed aviation systems. After sitting in the cockpit of CAASD's flight simulator, with its modern jetliner instrument panel and realistic outside-the-cockpit views, Garfield High student Marshawanda Burke exclaimed, "That was a blast! It was really fun—I want to try that again." While demo-ing a flight simulation system used by air traffic controllers, Casey McKether from Garfield High said that he really liked the system and asked if it could be purchased for his home computer. More than a few students left MITRE thinking that a career in aviation would be "pretty cool."

MITRE (www.mitre.org) is a not-for-profit national technology resource that provides systems engineering, research and development, and information technology support to the government. It operates federally funded research and development centers for the DOD, the FAA and the IRS, with principal locations in Bedford, Massachusetts, and Northern Virginia.

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