(Garden City, NY) — Over 500 FIRST® Long Island participants, their coaches, and families participated in the FIRST® LAUNCH: 2019 + ALL SYSTEMS GO! held at the Cradle of Aviation Museum on November 2. Robotics teams were on hand to showcase their work, promote applications for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics), and prepare for this year’s upcoming FIRST Challenges.

During their time at the Museum, participants were launched into this year’s challenges related to the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing: DEEP SPACE^SM, ROVER RUCKUS, INTO ORBIT^SM, and MISSION MOON^SM. Attendees were able to explore the Museum’s extensive Space Gallery collection, as well as ask Museum docents for details about the Apollo missions and the International Space Station. Attendees also had the opportunity to catch an out-of-this-world documentary, “Journey to Space,” which highlights Mars as the future of space travel.

In addition, the FIRST programs, presented by School-Business Partnerships of Long Island, Inc. (SBPLI), used this exciting event to announce the celebration of 20 years on Long Island with the unveiling of its 20th anniversary logo. Their role in providing students the chance to use their STEM knowledge through the creative, engineering process of constructing robots excites students about the future. Because of the massive success of the event, FIRST Long Island has entered into a partnership with the Cradle of Aviation Museum and will hold more events in the future.

“The Cradle is thrilled to have hosted the FIRST LAUNCH. FIRST is a perfect match for the Museum. The program encourages students to learn to work together, inspires them to be STEM engineers, and provides a foundation for real-world problem solving which gives students a great foundation for their future.” said Catherine Gonzalez, Education Director at the Cradle of Aviation Museum.

FIRST Long Island has teams in more than 90 school districts in grades one through twelve, as well as many home and community teams. Interested students can contact FIRST® Long Island for details about this year’s challenges and events at www.firstlongisland.org. Families interested in exploring Long Island’s role in the space program, or to see the feature “Journey to Space,” can visit the Museum any time. Museum information for film times and ticket prices are available online at www.cradleofaviation.org.