(NAPSI)—Some clever kids will win a share of $100,000--for not breaking eggs.

That’s because they’ll take part in the Team America Rocketry Challenge (TARC), the world’s largest student rocket contest and a key piece of the aerospace and defense industry’s strategy to build a stronger U.S. workforce in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. This year’s contest challenges students to design, build and fly a rocket carrying two raw eggs to an altitude of 850 feet and return them to ground with the eggs uncracked within 44 to 46 seconds.

Much more than broken eggs are at stake. According to the U.S. Department of Education, this country has developed as a global leader, in large part, through the genius and hard work of its scientists, engineers and innovators. In a world that’s becoming increasingly complex, where success is driven not only by what you know but by what you can do with what you know, it’s more important than ever for our youth to be equipped with the knowledge and skills to solve tough problems, gather and evaluate evidence, and make sense of information. These are the types of skills that students learn by studying science, technology, engineering and math—subjects collectively known as STEM.

As President Obama remarked, “[Science] is more than a school subject, or the periodic table, or the properties of waves. It is an approach to the world, a critical way to understand and explore and engage with the world, and then have the capacity to change that world.”

As part of this effort to develop future scientists, approximately 4,000 middle and high school students from across the nation compete in TARC each year. Sponsored by the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) and the National Association of Rocketry (NAR), TARC was created in the fall of 2002 as a one-time celebration of the Centennial of Flight, but by popular demand became an annual program.

Based on local qualification flights, the top 100 teams are invited to Washington, D.C. in May for the National Finals. Top placing teams split more than $100,000 in cash and scholarships and the overall winning team will travel to the United Kingdom to compete in the International Rocketry Challenge taking place at the Farnborough Airshow in July.

The contest’s rules and scoring parameters change every cycle to challenge the students’ ingenuity and encourage a fresh approach to rocket design.

To learn more, go to www.rocketcontest.org and www.aia-aerospace.org or call (703) 358-1000.

On the Net:North American Precis Syndicate, Inc.(NAPSI)