CWU students, faculty attend Washington Space Summit at Blue Origin

A group of Central Washington University students and professors were given an exciting opportunity to engage and network with representatives from aerospace companies last week at the Washington State Space Summit.

The summit, held July 5 at Blue Origin headquarters in Kent, brought together more than a dozen major commercial aerospace manufacturers and researchers with presences across the state.

Washington Senator Maria Cantwell and NASA Administrator Bill Nelson also attended the event, which highlighted Washington's status as an emerging leader of the commercial space industry in the United States. According to a report by the Puget Sound Regional Council, the sector generates approximately $4.6 billion a year and employs over 13,000 people.

As Nelson noted in a Seattle Times article, the astronauts who land on the moon in 2029 might be stepping off a lunar lander built in King County.

"We're going back to the moon after a half a century, and we're not going back just to go," he said. "We're going in order to learn, to live, to work, to invent, to create. In order to go to Mars and beyond. And we do so now with commercial partners."

The summit also brought attention to the increasingly central role that these companies play in the expansion of the nation's space program. As the Times article noted, most of Washington's aerospace ventures are NASA contractors or partners. The agency, which itself has no formal presence here, relies on 42 suppliers for its Artemis program, which aims to put an astronaut on the moon for the first time since 1972.

The CWU participants had the chance to showcase and discuss their rocket designs from the past two years of NASA's Student Launch high-powered rocket competition. Students also had a chance to sit inside a Blue Origin New Shepard capsule that had previously been to space.

Following the exhibits and meet and greet with Cantwell and Nelson, a panel discussion was held, focusing on the numerous job openings within the Washington aerospace industry. The discussion also centered around educational reforms aimed at filling these job opportunities at various levels, ranging from technical degree positions in manufacturing and fabrication to spinning-off technologies developed through academic research WA Universities.

The summit also emphasized the importance of keeping America at the forefront of aerospace and chip technology innovations. Meanwhile, Cantwell expressed support for establishing a NASA manufacturing hub in the Northwest, saying she is pushing for the establishment of a Manufacturing USA institute in the Northwest. The publicly funded institute would help research composite materials and thermal plastics, which are both central to aerospace manufacturing.

"We've [had] conversations with academia about this, with manufacturers in the supply chain, and with workforce labor organizations as well," she told the Times. "People who are already involved in aerospace training."

CWU is actively involved in supporting students in their pursuit of STEM careers and ensuring they are well-informed about the pathways to these opportunities.

Participating in programs such as NASA Student Launch, NASA eclipse ballooning project, and the K-12 level Northwest Earth and Space Sciences Pathways (NESSP) program-a NASA Science Activation Team based at CWU-exemplifies the university's commitment to preparing students for aerospace careers.