California's anti-discrimination law is blocking a college rocket club from coming to a NASA student launch competition in Alabama. The law prevents publicly funded travel to states determined to discriminate against gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender people.

Citrus College, a community college in the Los Angeles suburb of Glendale, Calif., won a spot at NASA's annual student launch competition, television station WABC reports. Sixty college teams will meet in Huntsville for the annual competition later this year.

But Alabama is one of eight states "now targeted by the California legislature's anti-discrimination law AB 1887," WABC reports. The school supports the law and says it will send the team to a competition in Mojave, Calif., instead.

At least one professor is trying to raise money and get permission for the team to come to Alabama on its own funding. An opportunity like this for community college students shouldn't be missed, mathematics professor Paul Swatzel says.