Carver Student Wins in Local NASA Design Competition

Disponible en: Español

After his team won a local contest in October, sophomore Samir Hassam of Carver High School now has a strong chance to be named on one of the teams representing the U.S. in the International NASA Space Settlement Design Competition in which 12 finalist teams from around the world will compete at NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston in July 2013.

Carver High School sent a total of six students to compete in the first of two local competitions. The campus will send another five students to the second local contest, which will be held in March 2013. At the local competitions, students are divided up into groups to ensure contestants work with peers from other schools.

According to Eric Hirtriter, engineer instructor at Carver High School, Hassam has a strong chance to compete at the international contest.

“After the March competition, there will be six high school students chosen from the team that won in October and six from the winning team in March,” said Hirtriter. “Samir has a very good chance to be chosen for the international competition. Not only was Samir on the winning team, but he also proved himself effective in the role of vice president of engineering.”

The local contests put high school students in the shoes of aerospace industry engineers designing a city in space that will be a home for more than 10,000 people. Student engineers demonstrate creativity, technical competence, management skills, space environment knowledge, teamwork, and presentation techniques to conquer the problems inherent in siting and designing a space settlement (aka space colony).

Each year, competition organizers develop a new design concept with its own special requirements. Contest teams work together to create a 40-page report that addresses the issues and communicates their ideas and designs. At the local contest held October 12-14, the students worked on designing parts and components for the new space station that will orbit the Earth’s moon in 2033. They also had to get contracts from mentors and faculty for manufacturing and services to assist in finalizing the design by the deadline.

“The students had to do many calculations such as the speed to generate gravity on the settlement, determine launch vehicles required to deliver products to space as well as how much electricity would be required to be generated, and much more,” explained Hirtriter.

He added that many students worked around the clock to ensure they met the final presentation deadline. The event is setup like a Project Lead The Way Engineering Design and Development course at the high school where students set up a company, delegate jobs, and work together in order to solve a problem as well as demonstrate the use of science and math in real world jobs.

The prize is the selection of the 12 finalist teams from around the world who are selected to compete with a new scenario in a live international competition with real engineers sharing their knowledge and experience in both engineering and management.

Invitations will be provided in late May 2013 to students of winning teams to inform them if they made the cut to compete at the international event. The invitations will provide the finalist competition dates, arrival instructions, and task description. At the international competition, the 12 finalist teams (12 members each) are tripled up to form four competing companies. Each company team will prepare a new design responding to a different request for proposal at the JSC Gilruth Center. Competition organizers will also designate four invited teams to participate with four members each.

The student company teams will work in conditions that resemble those experienced by members of high-pressure proposal teams in industry, with assistance from real working engineers and managers. Designs will be presented to an audience that includes the judges and competing teams. Additionally, presenters will answer the judges’ questions about their designs. The judges will select a winning design, and provide a debriefing describing merits and weak points of the proposals.

Hirtriter is very excited about the local and international events.

“This is a high level skills competition,” stated Hirtriter. “The difference between first and second place is so close. The local competition held in October drew several ties for second place. While Samir was on the winning team, Carver students DeMarcus Spearman, Héctor Alanis, Joshua South, David Coronado, and Héctor Coronado all had teams place second.

“I am very proud of the students and the level of skill they displayed. I have high hopes for Samir to be selected for the international competition and I hope we have another student or more on the winning team at the next local contest in March. I would be very excited to see our students selected for the international contest in July.”

Hassam (standing in black shirt to the left of student in purple shirt) is seen working with fellow teammates. He is also seen (kneeling, left front row) holding his team’s company sign in the featured image at top.

Alanis (seated next to student in white jacket) is seen working with his team.

South is seen in the back working on inventor drawings for his group’s final design while David Coronado is seen (foreground to the left) working with his fellow group members.