Applying HOL/PBL to Prepare Undergraduate Students into Graduate Level Studies in the Field of Aerospace Engineering Using the Puerto Rico CubeSat Project Initiative

This paper presents an educational perspective into the Puerto Rico CubeSat Project and its objective in preparing undergraduate students into graduate level studies in the field of aerospace engineering. The Puerto Rico CubeSat is a joint effort between the NASA Puerto Rico Space Grant, the University of Puerto Rico-Mayagüez, and other educational entities which promotes space science education. Among its many initiatives lies the Puerto Rico CubeSat project. CubeSats are miniature satellite originally designed for space science exploration. CubeSats are cube shaped micro scaled satellites of low mass and size targeted to perform a wide range of tasks, such as imaging, weather monitoring, gathering information collecting and transmitting data. Each group specializes in a specific engineering field: power, electronics, controls communications, electromagnetics and computing tasked with developing each components of the CubeSat. A project methodology was established and applied to the development of each subsystem of the CubeSat. This methodology consists of a combination of Hands on Learning (HOL) and Project Based Learning (PBL) approaches to help students acquire the necessary skills to succeed in a graduate level environment. The expected impact was not only to encourage and train undergraduate students into a graduate environment, but to develop a teaching platform that can be adapted by other institutions.