For Release: Jan 9, 2023
The Bezos Family Foundation has awarded a “Director’s Gift” to SystemsGo, the Fredericksburg, Texas-based nonprofit organization that provides curricula and training in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education to high schools in Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, and Abu Dhabi.
“We express our thanks to the Bezos Family Foundation directors for their continued support, which helps us affect the trajectory of our students’ futures,” said Rebekah Hyatt, Executive Director of SystemsGo. “We pledge to make good and responsible use of this generous gift in our work of creating the workforce of tomorrow.”
The Bezos Family Foundation is a private, independent foundation established by Jackie and Mike Bezos, whose vision is that all young people are prepared to achieve their full potential and make a meaningful contribution to society.
Their annual director giving is an opportunity for the Foundation’s leadership to support organizations doing meaningful work that aligns with the mission, but that may not necessarily be a fit for a standard grant.
The funds, totaling $45,000, will help support the innovative SystemsGo program, developed at Fredericksburg High School in 1996.
SystemsGo is an innovative hands-on high school science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) set of courses that uses project-based learning to stimulate 21st Century workplace skills.
The upper-level students design, develop, test, and analyze professional-grade, free-flight, sounding rockets for research applications.
- Tsiolkovsky Level students design and test vehicles to loft a one-pound payload to an apogee of one mile.
- Oberth Level students attempt flight beyond Mach 1.
- Goddard Level students design and develop a vehicle capable of lofting a scientific payload to an altitude of 50,000 feet, in collaboration with the U.S. Army at White Sands Missile Range.
Each year’s projects culminate in a fully-supported launch event for all SystemsGo schools launching more than 150 rockets at one of five sites. In June of 2022 a SystemsGo school achieved a new world altitude record for a hybrid-propelled rocket designed and built by high school students.
More information is available online at www.systemsgo.org, via email at info@systemsgo.org, or by calling 830-997-3567.