The University of Hawaii has received a three-year, $480,000 grant for a new aerospace academy for Hawaii’s underserved high school students, the school announced Wednesday.
Participants of Hawaii’s Aspiring Aerospace Engineers Academy will be high school students, university students and faculty, as well as NASA experts and small business firms. The academy is designed to encourage students to pursue degrees and professional careers in STEM, particularly in Hawaii aerospace engineering jobs and the Hawaii aerospace industry in general, according to University of Hawaii at Manoa College of Engineering Professor Dilmurat Azimov.
“The proposed academy intends to serve as a steady, sustainable and guided pathway from high school, to college, to aerospace STEM careers,” Azimov told Pacific Business News.
The academy’s activities will include cultural curriculum, experiential learning, hands-on projects and research studies, he said.
It will provide lessons on NASA’s moon and mars mission programs, and on the development of aerospace technologies in order to “foster a group of aspiring young engineers to become the next generation of well-trained STEM professionals," Azimov said.
“In the project activities we intend to emphasize socio-economic aspects of the schools’ environments and multiple forms of diversity — cognitive, experiential, and demographic — which are important and beneficial to the creativity of the students and the impact of the academy on society.”
NASA has donated $3.8 million to a total of eight schools, including the University of Hawaii, as a part of its Minority University Research and Education award program, which supports STEM career aspirations of students from underserved communities.
