Starting next school year, Satsuma City Schools in Mobile County will begin Tango Flight, a two-year program where students learn how to—and actually build—a two-seater airplane.

“That’s a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) type of program, where the child will learn everything about aerospace. What makes a plane fly, to actually putting it together,” Tim Guinn, superintendent of Satsuma City Schools said. “From engine, to wheels, to the rudders, to the wings, the whole thing. And the neat thing about it is it will be a real plane, it will be licensed, it will be flown.”

Satsuma is the third school system in coastal Alabama to adopt the program. Tango Flight—a national nonprofit based in Texas—also works with B.C. Rain High School in the Mobile County Public School System and Gulf Shores High School, part of Gulf Shores City Schools. The three schools are the only ones in Alabama to participate in the program, which is capped at around 40 school districts nationwide.

Here’s how it works: students spend two years in a classroom, learning all of the academic skills around building an airplane. At the same time, the students are working on building the airplane—a Van’s Aircraft RV-12. Van’s Aircraft sends the school the materials needed to construct the plane as they progress, and when it’s completed, an inspector from the Federal Aviation Administration checks the plane to certify its airworthiness, according to Craig Anthony, director of development at Tango Flight.

“Tango Flight has a test pilot,” Guinn said, “and once it’s clear to their engineers and quality assurance, he will come down and take possession of the plane, and then he will test fly it. And when they give it the okay there, then the plane is good to be on the market.”