By Lookout Staff
May 2, 2016 -- More than 150
Santa Monica College students and faculty have applied for a program that
will allow them to work as paid interns at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
(JPL) in Pasadena this year, college officials announced last week.
The new ten-week Minority University Research and Education Program,
Community College Curriculum Improvement, generally referred to as MC3I,
will allow nine students and three faculty members to work on applied
projects at JPL, the nation's leading U.S. center for robotic exploration
of the solar system.
“We were expecting maybe 20 applications,” said SMC Geology
Professor Dr. Cara Thompson, Principal Investigator for the MC3I cooperative
agreement. “Instead, we received 150.”
During the program, student interns will be placed on teams led by a
JPL researcher and will collaborate on projects alongside graduate and
post-doctoral students, officials said.
SMC faculty "will have a chance to engage in professional development
that helps them stay current in their research field and pursue their
own project proposals," college officials said.
In addition to the internships, SMC is "developing curriculum and
math modules," as well as bringing experts to speak on campus and
organizing tours of JPL, officials said.
MC3I is one of three programs offered by the college in collaboration
with NASA and JPL that allow students training in Science, Technology,
Engineering, and Math, commonly referred to as STEM, to get a first-hand
look at careers in space exploration.
One of the programs, NASA’s National Community College Aerospace
Scholars (NCAS)features a five-week online course that culminates in a
four-day onsite experience at JPL and other NASA centers, officials said.
The program allows students to participate in an exercise "that
reflects what an actual NASA team does," create a mock proposal and
compete to design, build and test a LEGO Mars robotic rover, officials
said.
Three of the eight SMC students selected in April will head to JPL, while
the other five will go to NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center
in Edwards, CA, officials said.
“There's a misconception that NASA is only interested in Harvard
or MIT graduates” says Alicia Baturoni Cortez, program manager for
NCAS at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “We do want them, but
we are also interested in people who are passionate about space exploration,
and who are really good in their chosen field.
"We bring in community college students who may have watched a shuttle
launch on TV as children, and show them that working for NASA is a realistic
goal, even if they never dreamed it was attainable,” she said.
The other program offered by SMC in collaboration with NASA and JPL,
called SIRI,
pairs students with a JPL scientist or engineer for a semester-long, credit-based
internship at JPL.
The interns are nominated by SMC faculty and selected by JPL mentors
"to work in-depth on a particular research project, officials said.
A minimum GPA of 3.0 is required for all three programs, but STEM faculty
members encourage “students who are eager to learn, and who realize
what an opportunity JPL presents them with” to inquire about the
programs, officials said.
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