Four Pella High Students were recently selected to participate in NASA’s Space Settlement Design Competition held at NASA Headquarters in Houston. Biology and Chemistry teacher Erin Yoder takes the annual trip with the students, and tells KNIA/KRLS that it’s a great experience for the students who plan on focusing on a career in a STEM field in the future. This year, the four students selected were Sally Ropes, Cole Siewert, Jake Speltz, and Alex Bragg. Yoder says that the competition teaches students to communicate, cope with stress, solve problems, and work as a team. Students had 23 hours to complete a plan to design a space settlement that could capture asteroids, and mine the asteroids for profits. Jake Speltz was a member of the team that won the competition, and members from his team are invited back to Houston this summer for the international competition.