Instructor: Dawn Sumner, Department of Geology, College of Letters and Science
Description: During this seminar, students will work in groups of about 5 to design an instrument to put on a rover for a mission to Mars based on NASA space exploration procedures. Each group will be given a budget, a weight limit, a list of potential instruments, and enough information to design their instrument to accomplish a goal set by each group. They will propose their instrument to a committee of peers for feedback and approval. The group will then evaluate the mission as a whole and make adjustments as needed for success. About week 4, the students will be provided with edible materials to build their instrument, the instruments will be assembled onto a “rover,” and we will have a launch party. Week 5, we will have a landing party. Weeks 5-7, students will run the mission much like NASA and scientists run real rover missions, with different jobs assigned to individuals. Newly formed science working groups will submit written and oral mission reports to the entire class on the last week. Students will learn a mix of scientific information about Mars, engineering information about space missions, and administrative procedures used by NASA. More importantly, they will gain skills in making decisions as a group within financial and technical constraints; evaluating their own and others ideas in a constructive, collaborative environment; presenting materials to their peers; and interpreting data to make choices.
Format: We will meet weekly for 2-2.5 hours for 8 weeks starting 10/4. Students will need to gather additional information about Mars and exploration instruments, mostly from NASA web sites. They will need to prepare written and oral components of their reports out side of class time, which may involve group work.
Grading:
| Class Participation | 30% | Contributions to class and group discussions and ideas |
| Mission Proposal | 15% | Group written and oral reports |
| 15% | Individual contribution to reports (as reported by student) | |
| Spacecraft Construction | 10% | Group creativity in use of materials as judged by peers |
| Final Mission Report | 15% | Group written and oral reports |
| 15% | Individual contribution to reports (as reported by student) |
About the Instructor: Professor Dawn Sumner is a member of the Geology Department. Her research focuses on the early evolution of life, early Earth’s ocean chemistry, and how microbial communities affect rocks. Dawn is also a member of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program Advisory Group, she recently helped rewrite the scientific goals involved in the search for life on Mars, and she is part of a proposal to build and operate a camera for the next Mars rover mission, which will launch in 2009.