Student Update by Ari Messinger
May 2026
The Leffell Space Program is proud to announce that its students, along with Leffell Engineering Design and Arts (LEAD) faculty members, successfully launched, tracked, and recovered a high-altitude balloon on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.
The major system that the students have worked on has been the payload box, which was attached to the balloon via a complex rigging setup that included a parachute and multiple radio transmitters. While much of the challenge in designing, building, and testing different components of the payload was faced early on in the process, finding a suitable launch window had proven difficult, resulting in about six postponed launch dates. The dependency on clear skies, low ground winds, and viable predictions in the team’s prediction software made finding a time nearly impossible. When a window opened, the students were overjoyed that they could finally launch.
Upon arriving at the launch site in Hudson, NY, the students promptly unpacked all of their gear and began setting up everything that was necessary for launch. Within minutes, however, issues began to arise. Certain programs began crashing, one transmitter had the wrong code, and a small component that was crucial for holding the payload in place had fallen off. They divided up into subteams and began tackling the issues one by one, while a different group began filling the balloon with helium. Once the problems were resolved and the balloon was filled, it was launched, tracked, and then recovered in Hartford, CT, about three hours southeast of the launch site.
From early conceptual diagrams in December 2024 until the end of recovery, the entire mission demanded tireless effort and taught skills far beyond how to wire a sensor, including lessons in collaboration and perseverance. Both throughout the 18 months of building and during launch, the team’s hard work and refusal to give up model a powerful example of resilience rooted in Jewish history.
This achievement marks the official end of the program's first major mission, and yet it is only the first of many to come. Throughout the 2025-2026 school year, the program’s students have been studying everything radio: different types of transmission protocols, the math and physics behind radio waves, and how to use various types of antennas. Utilizing these new skills, they have begun working on a ground station to track satellites passing overhead. The program’s overarching goal is to launch its own satellite in 2028 and track it with this ground station.
Ultimately, considering both the achievements of launch and recovery and the optimism that they represent for the program’s future, this mission was a resounding success. Through this mission, Leffell Space has proven that the sky is not the limit; it is just the starting point.
The Leffell School Space Program was inaugurated in the 2024-25 school year with the goal of launching a Leffell-produced satellite into space in the year 2028. This elective program offers a comprehensive, multi-year experience for High School students with a strong interest in science, engineering, and problem-solving.
During the first year, participating students engage in collaborative engineering projects designed to develop practical experience and skills relevant to the field of space exploration, including constructing a ground station for satellite communication and participating in the design, launch, and monitoring of a high-altitude weather balloon system. In the following years, students will conceptualize, develop, construct, and test a miniature spacecraft, known as a CubeSat, approximately equivalent in size to a shoebox (1000 cm³). The ultimate objective is to procure a launch contract and send the CubeSat into space.
The program is directed by our own Engineering and Entrepreneurship teacher, Raz Idan, who holds a bachelor's degree in physics and material engineering from Ben-Gurion University and a master's in space system engineering from Johns Hopkins University.
We are incredibly excited to be one of the first K-12 schools in the United States to offer a program in space studies that will culminate in an actual launch. Supported by the entire school community, this endeavor is representative of our communal values of teamwork, creativity, curiosity, ambition, and the boundless prospects of scientific exploration.
