2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Activities to promote engineering engagement can be costly to implement. Developing low-cost, low barrier engineering outreach activities can broaden access. This paper describes the development of a low-cost engineering outreach activity on the topics of optimization and human space flight. The activity discussed in this research is a pilot to enable refinement for larger-scale implementation.
The activity can be completed in 45 minutes and is targeted at 3rd-6th grade students. The students are told they will be responsible for determining what to “pack” for astronauts for a trip to the moon. The students must decide which items to pack and which to leave behind to make the “best” packing list. They are provided with a fixed size paper “cargo bay” made of discrete squares and paper items of various “lengths” in squares and values. The optimum solution can be achieved by dividing the value for an item by its length of squares and filling the cargo bay with the highest value/length items. Students not able to perform this level of arithmetic can also approach the problem by reasoning through which items may be the most useful for the mission. Practical items such as fuel are provided along with impractical items such as rubber ducks.
The students are provided an independent opportunity to solve the problem with no restrictions on the problem solving method. The first part of the activity introduces students to the concept of optimization and how optimization tools are needed in real world engineering problems. The solution is revealed and students can adjust their cargo bays. In the second half of the activity, students are asked to pack the “worst” list in the cargo bay. The activity introduces the concept of constraints and assumptions when the solution to the “worst”, or lowest value, packing list is revealed to be packing nothing at all. The students are then provided the solution to the “worst” packing list with the constraint that the cargo bay must have all spaces filled.
The activity, titled “Pack for Space” was piloted with a group of 4 graduate students in 2022 and then conducted between 2022-2024 with groups of 15 - 20 elementary students at the annual Girls in Science and Engineering Days hosted at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. A cost estimate for running the activity, materials, and a guide to repeating the activity is provided for teachers and practitioners. This paper explores the development of the “Pack for Space” activity.