Last year, more than 1,500 cadets from 122 squadrons across all eight Civil Air Patrol regions participated in CAP's National High-Altitude Balloon Challenge. Our cadets designed more than 500 experiments for launching to the stratosphere in 50-milliliter test tubes on high-altitude weather balloons. Begun as the first national cadet STEM competition in 2021, the balloon challenge involves innovative cadet-designed science experiments to test high altitudes’ effects on various items. Teams from