Les Gold Aerospace Education specialist speaks to students at Immokalee Middle School.

Les Gold, Aerospace Education specialist with KSC, speaks to students at Immokalee Middle School in Naples, Fla. At right is astronaut Terry Virts. Gold and Virts accompanied Center Director Jim Kennedy for a presentation at the school to share the vision for space exploration with the next generation of explorers. Immokalee is part of NASA’s Explorer School (NES) Program and is teamed with Pine Ridge Middle School. Kennedy is talking with students about our destiny as explorers, NASA’s stepping stone approach to exploring Earth, the Moon, Mars and beyond, how space impacts our lives, and how people and machines rely on each other in space. NES establishes a three-year partnership annually between NASA and 50 NASA Explorer Schools teams, consisting of teachers and education administrators from diverse communities nationwide.