Now here's a cool story. What does your homework consist of? A research paper, perhaps some math problems? What if you spent your time getting ready for space travel?

For students seeking higher education, you can't do much better than a classroom at the edge of space.

Thanks to Student Hands-on Training (SHOT) workshops, aspiring satellite researchers can trial-run payload ideas by getting a lift from skyward-soaring balloons. SHOT activities are on-going at the NASA-funded Colorado Space Grant Consortium at the University of Colorado.

Can you imagine building something, all by yourself, that will soon afterwards head into the infinite heavens? The mind. It boggles.

SHOT workshops have been underway for four years, with universities from around the country taking part, Koehler explained. Just last month, two balloon launches hauled 10 student packages high above Earth with all of them successfully recovered.

Not all the payloads worked as planned, Koehler added. "I told them-as I do other students-that you usually learn more from your failures than you do your successes."

You can read the rest of this amazing story
here.

I'll admit, I'm jealous. Flying around in a huge balloon seems so much more fun than analyzing the works of Goethe. I think I missed out.

(Photo Source: Space.com)