Meet DreamUp to Space Team Member Quentin Gauge

By iLEAD Exploration learners Grace Stumpf & Raegan Brown

DreamUp to Space is a project that challenges young people to understand and explore the impact that microgravity has on matter. Through a partnership with DreamUp, iLEAD learners in grades 5-12 are inspired to develop the skills and knowledge to design, develop, and propose an experiment that could be run on the International Space Station.

In July of 2020, two teams from iLEAD Schools were selected for flight in the 2020 DreamUp to Space Virtual Mission & Experiment Design Challenge. Currently, learners from across the iLEAD Schools’ network were selected and are now collaborating on these two “Launch Teams” — Team Carrot and Team Adzuki — in preparation for a spring launch of their experiments to the International Space Station.

Each learner has unique interests, strengths, and goals to bring to each team. We’d like to introduce you to our team members! Today we’re introducing Quentin Gauge.

Meet Quentin Gauge, Team Adzuki

Quentin Gauge is a 6th grade learner at iLEAD Exploration. He is the principal investigator (a fancy way of saying he had the original experiment idea and proposal) of Team Adzuki. In his spare time, Quentin enjoys building Legos and making stop-motion animations. Quentin also likes to read biographies and autobiographies and is a Harry Potter fan. He likes to cook for his little brother and frequently helps his parents in the kitchen. His favorite food is Mongolian dumplings, because he is half Mongolian and loves to celebrate his culture. We were given the opportunity to ask him a few questions!

Favorite book and why?

“My favorite is the The Trials of Apollo series by Rick Riordan because it is a mythology-based book, and I love how Greek mythology stories show important morals and have fun, exotic stories.”

What do you want to do when you get older? Do you have a dream job?

“I have many interests right now. I could see myself as an astrophysicist and a professor at CalTech. I could become a singer like my grandfather, or a doctor.”

Who do you look up to?

“One person I look up to is my grandpa, who used to be a famous opera singer in Mongolia. I look up to him because I love to sing and because he always helps me and always pushes me to become a good singer.”

How does it feel knowing you are getting an opportunity very few people have ever had: to be part of a team sending an experiment to space?

“I feel extremely lucky to be part of such an incredible opportunity. It is a rare thing for a twelve-year-old to be sending an experiment to the ISS. It is even an unheard of and unimaginable thing to go anywhere in the world, or even to other parts of the United States, and that is why I feel like the luckiest kid in the world.”

We look forward to introducing more team members to you soon!