The Senior Design Project Support Program is meant to offer supplemental funding in support of high-level student-led research and design projects. Projects must show clear relevance to NASAs mission and ongoing research at one or more of the NASA centers/under the umbrella of one or more of the four mission directorates. This funding source is meant to supplement the cost of materials and supplies and/or travel for competitions related to the student project. Senior Design programs are a holistic experience where the students function as real-life engineers with real-life challenges and responsibilities beyond the technical aspects of the profession. They work as teams on largely industry-inspired/sponsored projects and after two semesters they deliver an engineered system/product, which is defended in front of a panel of experienced expert professionals. They have to deal with the challenges of teamwork, project and budget management, estimation, procurement, redesigns, as well as hands-on manufacturing and communications of all forms with their clients, supervisors and the public. Industry, government, private and non-profit agencies partnered with student groups to sponsor innovative projects designed to provide solutions to current engineering challenges. This program supports the workforce development and research infrastructure goals of NASA Education. LaSPACE funds are typically used to help cover fabrication costs and travel expenses to external competitions or conferences for student participants.

Senior Design, ULL, Vaughan, Proposal Abstract: This project seeks to support travel of a senior projects team from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette to compete at ARLISS – A Rocket Launch for International Student Satellites. ARLISS is held on the Black Rock Playa (a dry lake bed) in Nevada in mid-September. It was established to give students hands-on experience in the design, construction, testing, and launch of space systems. ARLISS participation by UL Lafayette was jump-started by a previous LaSPACE grant. This proposal will support the continuation of the promotion of aerospace research and education at UL Lafayette through ARLISS. The senior design team will develop their design in the fall of 2017 and spring and summer of 2018, then attend the ARLISS competition in September. Following the contest, they will use the results of the ARLISS competition to evaluate their initial design and iterate on it. This is an opportunity not often presented to capstone design students, but one that is crucial to a successful design process. This project will begin in the fall semester of 2017 and end one year later, in October 2018. The project will be evaluated using the success of the teams in the ARLISS competition, the interest and participation in the UL Lafayette ARLISS team, and the capstone design teams performance in the capstone course relative to their peers.