Nilgiris to NASA: Ooty Boy Wins National Competition, Will Attend Global Conference!

Kaniishk S, from the Crescent Castle Public School, Ooty, is a lucky boy as his space dreams are coming true. He will participate in the International Space Science Conference, to be conducted by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in November 2018, reports The Times of India. The Class X student is a son of an agriculturist.

Kaniishk won the first prize in the National Space Science Essay Competition, organised by Go4Guru. The topic was ‘If I happen to meet an alien in Mars’. He found his way in the initial shortlist of 500 from around 3,000 entries. NASA then picked around 300 entries, and Kaniishk’s essay won him the first prize pan-India.

During the week-long trip to the space giant, Kaniishk will be interacting with leading space scientists and astronauts. The boy is naturally excited and told TOI that space research was going to be a big part of his life.

The school management and teachers are proud of his achievement, and his parents can’t stop beaming.

Here’s wishing Kaniishk all the very best!

NASA has earlier interacted with students, and has even organised competitions for them across the world. Incidentally, NASA once had a Space Apps Challenge, a 48-hour international hackathon that saw an Indian team secure a place in the global finalist nominations.

In yet another initiative, NASA held a competition at their Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. The International Space Settlement Design Competition in 2015, saw a team of 12 students from Amity International School in Noida, who won the first place, beating other participants from all over the world.

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And how can one forget the group of students from Mukesh Patel School of Technology Management and Engineering, NMIMS, in Mumbai, who successfully completed the prestigious human exploration rover challenge, set by NASA, and even filed for a patent for their design!

Well, it is indeed great to see NASA encouraging potential students worldwide, giving them opportunities to pursue their space dreams.

(Edited by Shruti Singhal)

Featured image credit: Crescent.

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