Christa McAuliffe

I touch the future. I teach.

The president felt that it was important to send an ordinary citizen to experience the excitement of space travel as a representative for all Americans.

NASA was going to pick a public school teacher to go into space, observe and make a journal about the space flight, and I am a teacher who always dreamed of going up into space.

I cannot join the space program and restart my life as an astronaut, but this opportunity to connect my abilities as an educator with my interests in history and space is a unique opportunity to fulfill my early fantasies.

My job in space will be to observe and write a journal. I am also going to be teaching a class for students on earth about life in space and on the space shuttle and conducting experiments.

I will go around the space shuttle and give a guided tour of the major areas and describe what is done in each area. This will be called The Ultimate Field Trip.

If I can get some student interested in science, if I can show members of the general public what's going on up there in the space program, then my job's been done.

Space is going to be commonplace.

Reach for the stars.

Reach for it. Push yourself as far as you can.