I Believe This Class Met My Expectations Overall

I Believe This Class Met My Expectations Overall

Gateway to SpaceExpectations

I believe this class met my expectations overall. At the beginning of the semester I really didn’t know what this class entails. I thought building a satellite would be interesting but I never expected the time and effort that goes into constructing one. I learned many valuable skills and lessons throughout the course of this class. Teamwork is the key to not only to accomplish the class but to succeed in today’s fast growing Aerospace industry. I also realized that people will let you down due their issues and conflicts. But we just had to look past them and work just a little bit harder to get to mission accomplished. This class had its downs with satellites not working, team members getting upset and frustrated etc. But in turn it brought our team closer together to make it a great semester.

I wish there had been a little more guidance, at least close to launch. I feel like if either you or Noah inspected our satellite you may have had a few simple suggestions that would have made our flight more successful. I was totally satisfied with the experience in general. I did like the freedom you gave us to do what we want. I think you should keep yourself apart from the building process as much as possible unless teams come to you for help, like you did this semester. I also would have liked to get our design documents back with comments on how to improve our design or our presentation of the design. Maybe you do not need to return the entire the paper, but at least a grading rubric, so that we can see what was missing or what we needed to improve upon as a team. I feel that this class was worthwhile and that I learned a lot about the engineering

process and that I will be better off because of the class.

The class has met every expectation that I had made for the class. The class was a ton of fun, but very intellectually challenging at the same time. I was able to learn a great deal of information that will help me in the future in aerospace. Soldering, designing, building, and launching my first satellite are something that I will never forget. I thank you for this wonderful opportunity.

Yes my expectations for this class were met! I absolutely loved everything about the class! I can’t believe that I learned how to build a BalloonSat! I remember seeing those in the window when I was up here a couple times for tours and learning groups and was amazed by them! Now I can say that one of those is mine!! I have learned so much that will help me for the rest of my life! I think that it is really cool that I know how to solder, right a RFP, and power points! I have learned so much in this class! I am glad I didn’t take a projects class instead! Thank you so much!

The greater majority of my expectations were easily met by this class. I however expected to gain a better working knowledge of the actual integration involved with the satellites. Moreover, I expected that to be a lot more complicated. This was definitely a result of the simplicity of our own design, so I am not complaining.

My expectations aside, I was completely impressed by this class. I cannot think of a different way to learn so much about the professional side of space exploration.

And in no offense to this class whatsoever, this class did help me narrow down my career desires in Aerospace away from satellites and towards propulsion. This was mostly the guest lectures doing, as I decided that satellites are not the career for me.

My expectations for this class were met. After all when signing up all I signed up to do was build a balloon satellite. Fortunately my expectations were exceeded. Although certainly hard work this class was the most fun out of all my classes this semester. In addition I can say that I actually learned some useful stuff, how to solder, how to program a microcontroller, how to wire up electronics, and among other things how difficult it is to work in a group even if everyone gets a long well. Calculus and chemistry have not taught me anything nearly as applicable to my life yet. Obviously the best part of this class though was the creativity involved as well as the hands on nature of the class. One thing that truly surprised me was the amount of teams with failures, and most that were the result of simple errors that could have easily been caught and fixed in testing. When the whole function of a class is to build a satellite that has working cameras and science on it and then after three + months of working on it and testing it it fails to work that just doesn’t make any sense to me.

My expectations coming into this class were few. Initially, I took this class because my academic advisor, Claire Yang, suggested this class to me. I had mentioned that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to specialize in the aeronautical or space part of aerospace. She said this class would help me make that decision easier. Additionally, it just looked like a fun class. It would count as a project credit, and it would be a project I could connect to with much more enthusiasm. This was all before the first day of class. Upon being presented the syllabus and goals of the course, I changed my outlook slightly. I realized that we would be doing much more than I had originally thought. Once I looked over the course outline and saw what we would do, I was optimistic as to how much we would be learning. It promised to be a very worthwhile course.

Looking back, I have learned even more than I thought I would, and about much different things than I expected. Not only did I gain more experience with building structures and basic electrical work, but I learned a great amount about communications with other people and companies. There was much to be learned about contacting companies, talking to sales people, working out orders and handling, and the like. I learned to start on projects and research as soon as possible, and to explore every possibility even though you may already have a solution. However, it’s not enough to secure parts and build a box. One of the biggest lessons I learned was to think every part of the project through, including the post-experiment analysis. Good lessons learned.

There were a few lessons that took the entire year to be realized. This course was a lot more work than it was made out to be. Three credit hours doesn’t seem like enough for the work I did building this satellite. Also, there was a lot more expected of us than I thought fair sometimes. We’re just freshman, and bound to make mistakes, so it seemed impractical to put so much pressure and blame on people for making mistakes. There is no doubt that I have learned from this, but it was a little extreme, in my opinion.

Overall, I had a lot of fun during this class. I learned a lot more than the normal college freshman would learn in bookwork classes, and I’m proud of my team for putting something like this together. I would most definitely recommend this course to any aerospace or other engineer, freshman or not.

My expectations for this class were met. I was expecting to build a satellite and fly it. Not only did I get to do this, but I also got to learn how to produce a design document that recorded the entire process of designing, building, flying, and recovering the satellite. I also got to meet a lot of very fun cool people. The class as a whole was very fun and I would recommend it to all incoming Aerospace Engineers.

My expectations for this class exceeded my initial thoughts. I knew this class would involve some engineering, but not to the extent we took it. I really felt like an aerospace engineering. We worked out designs for weeks, had to yell at some manufacturers, and made plenty of contacts. Coming strait out of high school, I didn’t know how much could be expected of us, but I was willing to learn everything I could to build this craft. I know this project will be a source of inspiration during the difficult years ahead. My only suggestion would be more allowable mass. Our team was very eager to fly many experiments, but do to weight we had to cut almost every one of these ideas. I know with at least 300 grams more our team could have flown solar panels, Aerogel, and a better boom camera. But working within our limits was a great challenge. I think my favorite part was creating new tests to put the craft through.

When I came into Gateway to Space I knew that we would build a satellite. I expected that we would work on the satellite throughout the full semester and we would work in class so we would be able to ask for help if we ran into problems. I expected that we would have an experiment assign to us and groups would be formed. Last I expected to learn all about aerospace engineering. After taking the class I can say that my expectation were mostly meet. We did build a satellite; however I did not feel like we did, because everything failed so my grade reflects that in a way. We only worked in class two days and that really disappointed me because it was hard for our group to make meeting so that everyone could be there. I think we had problems because no one wanted to make decisions without everyone agreeing on it and as a result, we fell behind. I am glad that the experiment was not assigned, this way we all wanted to do the experiment. If it was forced on us then no one might put any effort in it. I did learn a lot about aerospace, mainly on the presentations and proposal side of engineering. All in all, this class has encouraged me to battle sophomore year.

I believe my expectations for this class were met. Before entering this class, I expected to learn what it takes to build and send a satellite into space. I also expected to learn about how this process works in the real world. I definitely learned all this from this class and I am glad that I took it to prepare myself for Senior Design Projects and for work in the industry.

Yes they were. I was able to learn about the design and building of a satellite and see the time and effort that has to be put into a Proposal. This gave me the hands on experience I was looking for to be able to get me a good chance at an internship or job. Was just given the ability to test things and experiment. Good class enjoyed it, especially the failure and learning from it. It was a change

My expectations for this class were met after taking this course. I did not expect for this class to be such a hands-on activities sort of thing, but I am glad it was. I learned a lot, not only about industry and expectations, but also about the skills that it takes to actually work with a team. If you work with the team you will succeed and overcome obstacles. If you don’t, then everyone fails. This is extremely relevant to industry and what it takes to survive. I am very happy that I took this course and really want to pursue a second course like this. Possibly Gateway 2 Space, the sequel to the best-selling course. Take in consideration it’s 1:00 AM when I’m typing this.

Ultimately my expectations were in fact meet. From the start I expected to learn the process to successfully launch a satellite and gain other vital technical and interpersonal skills that will be required of me before I start my career. However I felt somewhat disappointed as I never learned any fantastic new skill like how to run a new program or something of that nature. I believe that a workshop on a program like solidworks should be offered separate from the class to learn how to model structures like the cubesats. Also I wish classes could have been more informative, more like a lecture in fact because most of the lectures made me feel uncapable as all were top level introduction speeches. I already knew a lot of the material presented as a lot was based on common sense. I did like how the class was laid back and we got to watch little movie clips. Hans Koehler was also vital and needs to come back.

My expectations where pretty much met. I had some friends who took this class and told me what it was about. I was excited to get a chance to build a mini-satellite and launch it, and I defiantly learned a lot of very important lessons from doing that

During this class there were a lot of expectations placed on us as students. We were expected to learn a lot on our own and have far more hours working outside of class than in class. While I was informed of the workload before taking the class, I never would have imagined the countless hours I spent trying to learn how to program our satellite. I did expect to learn more of the programming types of things in class, but due to the diversity of experiments done by students, there would have been no way to really teach everyone how to work their satellite.

I thought that the class overall was very good. I felt that I learned a lot and that the team experience will be very helpful over the course of my career. I did expect to be taught more but understand that that is difficult to do when so much team time is required in order to achieve our goal of launching a balloon satellite.

I also felt that the Noah did a great job as T.A. He was very knowledgeable and always willing to help the teams when asked.

One thing that I think needs improvement on is what, where, and who to go to for different types of hardware and information. I think that more hints on what has worked for others would be very beneficial to students.

Overall the class was great, I met a lot of great people and had a blast making the balloon satellite.

Definitely! This was the best class I have ever taken. It has prepared me more for the engineering field than any other class could have done. Thank you, Chris!

Looking back at homework one, I had two major expectations. I hoped to gain experience in the aerospace field and to have a better understanding of spacecrafts/satellites and how they work.

I do feel that both of these expectations were met. I think that the guest lecturers, as well as regular lectures, did give me a good idea of what the aerospace industry is all about. We were able to hear from a wide variety of individuals ranging from propulsion experts to power experts. I guess I learned that the responsibilities in the field are varied and quite demanding. Nonetheless, what the guest speakers had to say was very exciting as well.

My second expectation was meet exceedingly well. We were given the concepts and constraints of a “satellite” and we had to incorporate the larger systems such as thermal, structures and power. Unfortunately, the other systems were not within the scope of the project, but we still learned quite a bit about each.

Overall, I would say that my expectations were well met! I wasn’t expecting the class to be so demanding, but I am sure that it is only a preview of what is to come.

At the beginning, I was totally psyched and a little bit freaked out at how difficult it’s going to be to figure out what all we need to do and try to figure out for ourselves, but it turned out to be better. Definitely what I expected and more, it was my favorite class this semester, I would have gladly worked more hours a week than all my other classes combined and loved it more than any one of those other classes.

My expectations for this class were mostly met. I had hoped to learn more of the mechanics of space flight and the actual science behind rocket launches, but after taking the class it is clear that this is simply beyond the scope of a freshman project class. The experience of working on a complicated project in a large team was very valuable and should help me in the future. I was also pleased with the number of guest lectures from real representatives of the aerospace industry. Overall, this class met my expectations.

When I joined the class I only expected to build a satellite, launch it and then recover it. But the class was more than just that, it involved a lot of paper work and then presentations. Personally I did not want to do all of that but then I realised towards the end of the class that all the other activities that we did in class are very important in the real world. Doing presentations has made me more confident and I think I can know easily present an idea.

Even though the class was different from what I expected but I still enjoyed the class. The only thing I did not like about the class is all the guest lectures.

I believe that all of my expectations for the class were met. At the beginning of the year I thought that this would be a challenging class where we learned more from experimentation and research than we did from lectures. Although we did learn a lot from the lectures, I feel that I did learn a lot more by working on my group’s satellite and making mistakes. When something didn’t work right we had to try to figure out what was wrong and from that I believe that I have learned so much more and that was the expectation that I had.