New Earth: one world, built by students from across the world
Next week, schools and students from across the world log into one shared Minecraft world. From 4 to 10 October 2026, New Earth is part of World Space Week 2026, and it is one of our favourite weeks of the year.
The idea is simple. Students start on Earth, each with a plot of their own and a rocket to design. Then they land on Mars and build a habitat together, using what they packed. Along the way they solve real problems, explain their thinking and work alongside students they have never met.
Here is what New Earth is, why we think it is a cracking formula for learning, and how your school can still join before registrations close on Friday 2 October 2026.
What New Earth is
New Earth runs in two worlds, one after the other, on a single server hosted by Apex Hosting.
Earth comes first. The Earth world opens on Sunday 4 October at 5pm US Central time. Every student gets their own plot and builds a rocket on it. The heart of the challenge is the payload: what would you take to another planet, and why? There is no single right answer, which is exactly what makes it a good question. The first few days are an on-ramp, so students who are new to the world have time to find their feet.
Then Mars. On Wednesday 7 October at 2pm Central, Earth closes and the Mars world opens. The rockets have landed. Now students build a habitat together with what they brought, and the choices they made on Earth start to matter. Mars stays open until Friday 9 October at 9pm Central, so students in every time zone get a fair go at building during their own day.
Every student who takes part receives a certificate. Students join on the standard Bedrock edition of Minecraft, using their own accounts and their own devices, so there is nothing for a school or family to buy. Many teachers already know Minecraft Education, the classroom edition; New Earth runs on Bedrock, which is the version students need.
Why working across the world matters
The students in our classrooms today will spend their working lives on problems that cross borders: climate, health, energy, food and, yes, space. The skills that carry them there are the ones you cannot learn on your own. Explaining an idea to someone who has never met you. Building on someone else's work. Agreeing on a plan with a person whose afternoon is your midnight.
That is the heart of collaborative learning: students learn more when they work towards a shared goal and make sense of things together. New Earth gives that idea a real stage. On Mars, one student may log off for the night while another, on the other side of the planet, picks up where they left off. Nobody owns the habitat on their own. Everybody builds it.
Something shifts when a student sees that the build next to theirs was made by someone thousands of kilometres away. The project stops feeling like homework and starts feeling like a mission. Students begin to ask questions about each other: what did they pack, why did they build it that way, what time is it where they are? Those conversations happen through the builds themselves, which is a lovely thing to watch.
For teachers and school leaders, this is global learning with no passports, no exchange paperwork and no extra platform to learn. For parents, it is a chance to see your child's creativity sitting alongside the work of students from across the world.
Why game-based learning works
Game-based learning and the gamification of learning get talked about a lot, so here is what the research says.
A large review in the Review of Educational Research pulled together studies of school and university students and found that "digital games significantly enhanced student learning relative to nongame conditions" (Clark, Tanner-Smith and Killingsworth, 2016). The same authors stress the key role of design: a good game works because of how it is built, and a great learning game works because of the problems it asks students to solve.
A second review, in Educational Psychology Review, looked at gamification specifically. It concluded that "gamification as it is currently operationalized in empirical studies is an effective method for instruction" (Sailer and Homner, 2020). Two features stood out: a story to step into, and competition combined with collaboration. New Earth has both. There is a mission to Mars to believe in, and every student builds their own rocket before everyone works on one shared habitat.
And why Minecraft? Researchers have noticed what teachers have seen for years. A literature review in Educational Technology and Society observed that "videogames such as Minecraft have aroused the attention of teachers and researchers alike" (Nebel, Schneider and Rey, 2016). Minecraft is open-ended. It gives students a shared language of blocks, so a student who is quiet in class can show exactly what they think. It lets them test an idea, see it fall over and try again. And it is a world many of them already know, so they arrive confident and ready to build.
Safe by design
Safety is built into New Earth from the ground up.
COPPA-compliant. We apply the protections of the US Children's Online Privacy Protection Act for every student.
No direct student chat, and profanity is locked.
Pseudonyms only. Other players see a student's Gamertag, never their real name.
Schools own their students. We never collect student lists, Gamertags or numbers. Each school manages its own students and its own consent, and we supply a recommended parent letter to make that easy.
Hosted by Apex Hosting, on one dedicated server for the week.
The people making it happen
New Earth is run by STEMAIVERSE, a US 501(c)(3) nonprofit, in collaboration with three organisations who share our belief that students everywhere deserve a place in the future of space.
Apex Hosting hosts the New Earth server. (LinkedIn)
The Space Prize Foundation partners with us on New Earth. (LinkedIn)
SWIFT, the Space Workforce Incubator for Texas partners with us on New Earth. (LinkedIn)
A big thank you to each of them.
New Earth is also part of World Space Week 2026, the global celebration held every year from 4 to 10 October. (LinkedIn) #WSW2026
Register your school
Registrations close on Friday 2 October 2026. There is no cap and no per-school limit, so bring as many students as you like. Clubs and out-of-school programs register through the same form.
Questions? Write to sarah@stemaiverse.org and our team will answer them. We cannot wait to see what your students build.
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