Winners of the 2019 OPTIMUS PRIME Spinoff Promotion and Research Challenge (OPSPARC)
Winners of the 2019 OPTIMUS PRIME Spinoff Promotion and Research Challenge (OPSPARC) traveled to NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, on June 18 and 19 for the ninth annual OPSPARC winners’ workshop and awards ceremony.
OPTIMUS PRIME, a shape-shifting character in the TRANSFORMERS universe, can change into different forms to solve different problems — and OPSPARC encourages young minds to do the same. “This challenge directly hits on what TRANSFORMERS is all about,” said Sarah Corben, the associate brand manager from Hasbro for TRANSFORMERS. “Spinoffs are in their own way TRANSFORMERS: they are more than meets the eye.”
Selected from a pool of applicants from grades 3-12th from the United States, Canada and United Kingdom, the winning student teams gave five-minute presentations of their spinoff technologies. Their stellar ideas were inspired by NASA innovations and received recognition from actor Peter Cullen, the voice of character OPTIMUS PRIME from the TRANSFORMERS franchise.
The awards ceremony consisted of presentations from OPSPARC collaborators, such as Adobe Spark, the National Institute of Aerospace, Ministry of Supply and Mad Science. Retired NASA astronaut Barbara Morgan also congratulated the winners via pre-recorded video message. “I am so proud of your problem-solving, your dedication, your hard work, your innovation, your creativity, and most of all of your desire to make this world a better place,” Morgan said. “Congrats to each of you and keep the spark going.”
“The goal of OPSPARC is to ignite creative thinking,” said OPSPARC Project Manager Erin Majerowicz. “Students do this by taking NASA technology and turning it into something that can help us here on Earth.” Examples of existing spinoffs include satellite television, internal thermometers, and even whale shark trackers: these products were intended for usage in space but have additional practical uses.
The challenge consisted of three missions: the first mission called for students to look for spinoffs in everyday life and participants in the second and last missions chose a specific NASA technology to re-design to benefit society. “There’s a twofold purpose behind OPSPARC,” said Chief of Goddard’s Strategic Partnerships Office Darryl Mitchell. One goal was to raise awareness of the practical and daily benefits of NASA spinoff technology, and the other was to motivate the next generation of STEAM innovators.
“We wanted to inspire the students to be interested in the space program,” Mitchell said.
While the challenge was STEAM-oriented in nature, the students also demonstrated the ability to communicate their complex ideas. “Learning how to communicate and explain your idea to others is really important,” said Adobe’s Senior Director of Education Initiatives Ben Forta, addressing the winners. “It wasn’t just the technology problem you solved, but also how to communicate it, which is a critical skill.”
Student presentations consisted of their winning submissions: Adobe Spark webpages complete with mission patch designs, the students’ thought processes, the problem they hoped to solve, and in-depth explanations of their spinoffs’ usefulness. For example, the inspiration behind Samuel Kyong’s, an elementary school age group winner, “Green Balance” project endeavored to create a stable artificial ecosystem. After bending down the microphone on the auditorium’s podium, Kyong explained how his invention could clean the air in any indoor facility using water, fish and plants. “It can be used in space, homes, offices or on Mars — once we start to colonize it,” he said.
The ceremony ended with an inspiring speech from Peter Cullen congratulating the winners for their achievement. “These demonstrations are prefect examples of teamwork, collaboration, brainpower, imagination and sensitivity to the Earth itself,” he said. “I’ve become convinced that as the younger generation is coming in our world will be in a great place.”
OPTIMUS PRIME and TRANSFORMERS are trademarks of Hasbro and are used with permission. © 2019 Hasbro, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
By Tamsyn Brann
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
