Higher Education
ASGC's higher education programs have helped infuse space sciece and technology into undergraduate and graduate courses at all campuses. The ASGC sponsors conferences, programs and seminars throughout the state which are attended by both students and faculty. New course curricula has been developed on two campuses. The NASA Summer Academy programs are supported by sponsoring student interns. The ASGC also supports graduate teaching assistants in high school science classes, who serve as mentors and teachers in schools with underrepresented populations. Statewide honors conferences have been partially supported by the ASGC. All fellowship awardees are required to perform a community outreach service, such as high school mentoring. All higher education programs support NASA's work force development initiative. Some examples of ASGC student projects follow below.
Crew Escape Contest
A pilot program provided hands-on, self-discovery of aerospace technology for college and high school students. Students designed, built and flew a rocket powered glider, achieved a stated altitude and returned a crew escape module to a specified position. The program was performed in the context of a one semester senior engineering design class at UAH with students participating in the program from the English Department and College of Administrative Science to learn about proposal writing and marketing. The project involved both college school students. ASGC provided funding for the necessary materials for the flight kits involved in the project.
KC-135 Reduced Gravity Student Flight Opportunity [website]
A reduced gravity experiment, involving eight students (two were ASGC scholarship students), was selected to fly on a NASA KC-135 aircraft during a parabolic maneuver which produces several 15 to 20 seconds of "weightlessness." The flights were provided by NASA through a competitive program designed to encourage work in microgravity science. A technical elective course was offered in UAH's Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Department. To expose students to microgravity experimentation, results of the research were disseminated via a web site, local and school newspapers, talking to local schools, an information booth at UAH's engineering open house, and an AIAA education paper. The results of the experiment show that, as anticipated, a baffled tank design was much more effective in enabling liquid transfer in a reduced gravity environment. Liquid transfer in reduced gravity without baffles is very ineffective and is sensitive to "g" perturbations. ASGC supports student travel to Houston and flight physicals required to conduct the research on campuses at UAH, Alabama, Auburn, UAB and Alabama A&M when they are selected for flight.
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