Consortium to benefit student researchers

NASA has conferred “designated” status on the Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium, a program to encourage space-related education, research and public service.

The new status roughly doubles funding for the Green Bay-based Wisconsin Space Grant Consortium. As a major research university, UW–Madison has been a key partner in the consortium.

Tom Achtor, WSGC’s associate director for research and executive director for science at UW–Madison’s Space Science and Engineering Center, says that the new status brings a “tremendous expansion of existing programs. It means larger grants to more students.”

Achtor says WSGC research grants have allowed professors at UW System campuses to work regularly with counterparts in Madison when they could benefit from their resources and facilities.

Twenty-four colleges, universities, corporations and nonprofit organizations belong to the WSGC. They include Ripon and Carthage colleges, seven UW System institutions and Orbital Technologies Corp., a Madison company with a space-related mission.

Space grant consortia were created by Congress in 1987 in the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Through NASA fellowships, and program and research support, all enhance the training of scientists and engineers at the university level, and provide teacher training in precollege education, says Frank Owens, director of NASA’s Education Division.