The Footprint Question
You are the first Pioneer Settlement to inhabit this rocky outpost away from your home base of Earth. Your community is filled with all types of experts. You have people ready to get to work on building your new community and society. You, however, have a mission:
How do you design a regenerative living system when living in a closed colony with only imports from Earth to begin on another planet? Your colony has been given many resources to start this young and thriving community: small livestock, seeds, soil, young plants, filtration systems, water purifiers, solar energy panels, greenhouse supplies, lighting, humidifiers, tenting, microorganisms, nanobots, portable solar/magnetic powered windmills, 3D printers, power supplies, and insects.
Working with what you have, how will you nurture this environment to grow and sustain you as a settlement and how will you transform your rocky, planetary environment to increase resourcing while also minimizing your impact on the native habitat?
Though we suggest the Moon or Mars, if your team feels passionate about a different location among the stars, we say YES! Dive in and have fun!
Guest Speaker
| Date/Notes | |
|---|---|
| Registration Opens |
December 1st, 2021
|
| Footprint Question Released | January 19, 2022 |
| Presentations Due | February 16, 2022 |
| Footprint Event | March 4, 2022 - time TBD |
| Age Eligibility | 6th through 12th Grades |
| Suggested team size | 2 - 10 members |
| Capacity | Registration is limited. |
Students will create an environmentally sustainable life support strategy - for life in space or on another planet!
STEAMSPACE™ is dedicated to opening the space frontier, in our lifetimes, to everyone. Beyond the boundaries of race, gender, ideological and socioeconomic difference, STEAMSPACE Education Outreach™ believes in opening this new path to any and all who would like to go. In order to be prepared for the world of Free Space and settlement, the human race must consider what to do once the traveling is over and we have arrived.
Hosted by STEAMSPACE Academy™, Huston Tillotson University, the Huston Tillotson University Natural Science and Environmental Justice Department, and the Dumpster Project, the Footprint Micro Challenge focuses on sustainability and environment for living off-world, as well as supporting our current home-base, Earth. Think closed, contained systems, regenerative and renewable solutions, and resource utilization!
Our partners will offer your challenge question on January 19, 2022 and then the 7 week challenge will begin!
Student teams will prepare their presentation in a manner that they agree upon. Presentations can be provided to judges in the form of video technology such as Mine Craft, Kerbal, Sims, Maya, Power Point, or slides. Students may also choose to simply talk as a round table speaker session. Judges will review presentations at the end of the challenge once all work is submitted. Presentation length is 10 minutes per team.
This challenge includes weekly mentoring meetings for participating teams with STEAMSPACE team members, Huston Tillotson University(HT) students/mentors, HT Instructors, and the Directors of The Dumpster Project. The challenge ends with announcements of winners and the distribution of Micro Challenge patches, certificates, and awards. Winning teams will also be included in our Academy library for future student use.
