NASA Microgravity Science Competition for High-School-Aged Student Teams

NASA participates in a wide variety of educational activities including competitive events. There are competitive events sponsored by NASA and student teams which are mentored by NASA centers. This participation by NASA in public forums serves to bring the excitement of aerospace science to students and educators. A new competition for high-school-aged student teams involving projects in microgravity has completed two pilot years and has national eligibility for teams during the 2002-2003 school year. A team participating in the Dropping In a Microgravity Environment (DIME) will research the field of microgravity science, develop a hypothesis, and prepare a proposal for an experiment to be conducted in a microgravity drop tower facility. A team of NASA scientists and engineers will select the top proposals and those teams will then design and build their experiment apparatus. When the experiment apparatus are completed, team representatives will visit NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio to conduct their experiment in the 2.2 Second Drop Tower and participate in workshops and center tours. Presented in this paper is a description of DIME, an overview of the planning and execution of such a program, results from the first two pilot years, and a status of the first national competition. ACRONYMS & ABBREVIATIONS 1 g Earth's gravitation attraction at sea-level, approximately 9.8 m/s 2 DIME Dropping In a Microgravity Environment ISS International Space Station NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration NCMR National Center for Microgravity Research in Fluids and Combustion NSTA National Science Teachers Association ITEA International Technology Education Association