A new way to teach science (op-ed)

In all the best engineering programs around the world, there are some classes that are different from others. Instead of being tested as individuals on their mastery of lectures and texts, the engineering design class is challenged to work as a team to design a complex engineering system capable of meeting a difficult set of requirements

A new high-performance, low-cost fighter aircraft with speed, range, ceiling, weaponry, survivability, and producibility capabilities all exceeding specified lower limits could be designed by an engineering class. Each subgroup of the class might be assigned to find the best solutions to critical areas, such as weaponry, structures, and cost.

The best solutions will conflict with everything else. If you want to maximize the aircraft's speed, you should use more powerful engines, but if you want to use more weapons, you should use less powerful ones. It is necessary to make trades to find a compromise that will enable the best aircraft. It is a deeply creative process, which is sometimes intensified further by having classes from different universities compete against each other in intercollegiate tournaments.

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I went back to graduate school to become an engineer after teaching secondary school science and math for several years. When I was a teacher, I did not see an engineering design class until after I was done teaching. It was immediately apparent to me that engineering design classes could be used to teach science in high schools.

I didn't do anything about it for four decades, but this summer I used my position as head of the Mars Society to try and figure it out. We made a public announcement in April that this summer the Mars Society would offer a six-week Mars mission design class and contest to students all over the world. The admission fee is low enough to be affordable to most people, but high enough to keep out freeloaders.

Everything would be done by zoom, but teams were organized according to time zone to facilitate collaboration. Forty students signed up for the event. Team 1 was made up of people from Europe and the Middle East. The second team was from India and East Asia. Teams 3, 5, and 6 were from different time zones in North America. The members of Team 4 were divided among the others.

During the first two weeks of the class, twelve different experts lectured on various aspects of Mars mission design, including life support, nuclear engineering, and astronomy. We didn't try to coordinate the messages delivered by experts into a party line. The readings offered by the lecturers were not always in line with the viewpoints. That is how it is in the world. It was up to the students to figure it out.

The design teams were able to work with this background knowledge. The problem they were given was to design a human Mars mission with the greatest scientific return assuming a transportation system capable of delivering up to 30 metric tons and a crew of up to six people. It was up to the teams to determine their landing site, science objectives, crew size, skills, and equipment, as well as the duration of their stay. They had to make a plan for their exploration.

The requirements were not in line with one another. A larger crew with the longest stay time on Mars maximizes the ability to explore. The consumables and accommodations required to support them take away mass that could be used for more extensive equipment, for example pressurized rovers or piloted helicopter that could greatly expand the crew's effective exploratory range.

The challenge did not include consideration of the interplanetary exploration system. NASA's goal is to exclude the mission's scientific purpose. The space agency's human Mars mission designs involve a 30-day surface stay in the least interesting areas. You can't go to Mars unless you can use it. The purpose of the mission needs to be the first thing that comes to mind.

The students spent three weeks working hard in their teams, with little guidance from their coaches, to develop and write up their designs.

Over the course of three days, there was a gunfight. Each team had 30 minutes to present their design to a panel of experts. College engineering design contests are usually done that way. Then we go in a different direction. On the second day, teams were given 30 minutes to destroy their competitors' designs. Each team had a chance to defend its design against the other teams.

In university engineering design contests, this procedure isn't usually used. It's similar to how things are in the real world. When you propose a design solution for a NASA mission or technology need, you have competitors trying to tear you down. It's true, I believe me on this. I'm aware. The process of attack and defense in our contest was more civilized than in the cutthroat free market because the critics had to make their attacks openly, rather than behind their targets. The kids loved it because of the intellectual dust-up.

The results were great. The teams delivered work that was way higher up in the school system. You don't have to listen to my words. Videos of the expert lectures, the teams' design presentations, attacks and defenses can be seen online.

Everyone could lose. The Asian team placed well on most of the others and won the contest as a whole.

I think that what happened in this class is worth a lot of scrutiny. The course has a direct impact on a small group of students, but its value is much more than that. It could become educational history. The engineering design is different from other classes in that it requires students to master some material for a test but also to work as a team to design a complex engineering system. It reverses the relationship between students and science. If you will, knowledge will become a tool, or even a magic sword, instead of being a burden. We need to locate it.

The students showed that the same method can be used in high schools. The value of debate was shown by them. Design Engineering is a contact sport. Pure science is what it is. Consider the uproar over the recent claims made for biosignatures in the Venus atmosphere, or the 1996 Alan Hills meteorite claims. There is never a conclusive conclusion to science. Engineers and scientists need to defend their ideas. To give students a chance to learn how science works, they need to mix it up themselves.

If you have time, please check it out. The kids had a great time. We will definitely do it again.

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