TO TACKLE WORLD PROBLEMS
What is the 2021 FIRST Global CubeSat Prototype Challenge?
Over 90 teams from around the world accepted this newest challenge from FIRST Global to tackle a pressing world problem by designing, building and launching a nano-satellite, called a CubeSat Prototype, into the lower layers of earth’s atmosphere. Their satellite would be used to record and return images and data to help in solving their self-identified problem.
These teenagers orchestrated every aspect of their mission, including building, coding, launching, recovering, and analyzing data. And they did it on their own – WOW!
FIRST Global CubeSat Prototype Challenge | FGC2021DR – YouTube
Participating teams include Afghanistan, Uruguay, Cambodia, and South Africa, among the more than 90 in total. Each team took on a specific mission to meet the challenge, for example:
- Cambodia: Launch an advanced weather station
- South Africa: Sense air and ground pollution
- Greece: Analyze reforestation of charred lands following raging wildfires
- Team HOPE: Gather weather measurement data
For some of the participating countries, launching a CubeSat Prototype into the lower atmosphere is an actual first for their country. By introducing a “space” component to this year’s Challenge, FIRST Global is inspiring and paving the path for students from around the world to learn together about the wide world of rewarding STEM careers, including those in aerospace and space research, engineering and exploration. Visit FIRST Global at https://first.global .
Team Cambodia – “We hope that we can inspire more and more young Cambodian students to join STEM in solving our society and the world problems… We want to break a social stigma that STEM is a difficult subject…. We fail a lot of times, yet we don’t give up.”
