NASA HAS is a program for high school juniors interested in aerospace, technology, Earth science, and NASA missions. When I got accepted to NASA High School Aerospace Scholars (HAS) in the fall of my junior year, I was super excited to begin my journey with NASA and space exploration.
From October to March, I did assignments on Canvas as part of the general NASA HAS course. The program had us submit one assignment each week, whether that be a discussion board, project, research activity, or optional design challenge. The assignments started off by teaching us basic computer programming through Scratch and the fundamentals of CAD design by having us create a Lego brick in TinkerCAD. As the program progressed, we began researching different moons and planets for our potential mission landing sites. I chose Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, because of its water ice, hydrocarbons, and diverse terrain perfect for scientific exploration. We made presentations about which regions of our selected celestial bodies we would like to explore and why, almost like an expedition plan review. My favorite activity was one of our last: the CAD model of our space base. This activity, along with the research I had done beforehand, helped me get a glimpse of what a career in aerospace engineering would be like. My CAD model had many features, including water and air filtration systems, power stations, habitual areas, and a research lab. At the end of the course, the students who had a cumulative course score of 70% or higher were invited to the NASA HAS Moonshot opportunity in the summer.
There were 2 options for Moonshot dates, and I chose the week of June 3. The HAS Moonshot program, as the name suggests, involved groups working to plan an expedition to the Moon over the course of five days. It was really cool to be able to work with rising seniors from all over Texas through Canvas, an online platform. Everyone was really smart and enthusiastic, and for some interesting reason, pretty much everyone in my group played an instrument. We did different activities the first couple of days to learn about the Moon, previous NASA missions, and relevant space technology. After that, we assigned roles for team members for our preliminary design review. My role on the team was Subtopic #1 Manager, which means I was in charge of researching and putting together a slide on the team’s plan for in-situ resource utilization experiments. Our preliminary design review video was 15 minutes long, discussing things like the landing site, our rover CAD, and experiments and technology involved. Throughout the week, we had a Game Moderator, Patti Ashley, and a NASA Consultant, Sarah Kendl, who helped us with our research and mission design process. Aside from the main mission, Moonshot had webinars each day where guest speakers from the field would share their experiences and advice. Overall, HAS Moonshot was an amazing learning and team bonding experience that taught me a lot about what it is like to work on planning a space expedition mission, and I am very thankful for being given this opportunity.
I am really amazed by everything I have learned this year through NASA HAS. This is definitely a stepping stone towards my goal of being an aerospace engineer. As people in the space industry say, ad astra.
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