Nearly a week before NASA’s latest rover, Perseverance, was scheduled to land on Mars, a first-grade class at Central Point Elementary was already well beyond the fourth planet from the sun, venturing clear out of the solar system with still about an hour to go before lunch.
The plan was to stay there for the day, gather as much data as possible, work on some core subjects then zip back just in time to be picked up by their parents back on planet Earth. And if there was time — and there usually is when you’re traveling at the speed of light times two — they could swing by Mars and see how Olympus Mons, the largest mountain in the solar system, compares to Mount Everest.
The students blasted off Friday morning shortly after entering Room 14 at CPE, which their teacher Kary Rogney had transformed into Mission…
