Winners Announced!
Space Up!
2023 Essay Competition
Image Credit: NASA (flag adjusted by WISANZ)
Lunar Base Kiwi 2053…
What would it be like to live and work on
‘Lunar Base Kiwi’ on the Moon in 2053?
For the Space Up! 2023 Essay Competition, students were asked to imagine what it might be like 30 years from now to be a part of the New Zealand team living and working on ‘Lunar Base Kiwi’.
Students were invited to learn about the types of technology and science that can help humans stay on the Moon through Resources (in section below) including video interviews with women space scientists and engineers working in space exploration fields in New Zealand and their own research, and to think about how science and technolgoy could be advanced by having a lunar base, or could be developed to help us go out and explore Mars. Students then submitted a 300 - 500 word submission sharing their vision of life and work for scientists Lunar Base Kiwi.
Congratulations to all the Space Up! members entered - all the entries were well developed, often incredibly creative and very well researched essays. The Space Up! Mentor judges were blown away by the high quality of submissions - and it was a difficult task to select our Winners and Runners Up in each of our 2 year group categories (Years 9 & 10 and Years 11, 12 & 13).
Space Up! and Women in Space Aotearoa New Zealand are thrilled to announce the following prize winners for our Space Up! 2023 Essay Competition:
Years 9 & 10
Winner: Sophie Ineson, Southland Girls High School
Runner Up: Katya Naserallah, Takapuna Grammar
Years 11, 12 & 13
Winner: Frida Peltzer, Lincoln High School
Runner Up: Shreya Narayan, One Tree Hill College
Congratulations to all our prize winners for their exceptional essays - and to all Space Up! members who submitted entries.
All the entries showed excellent passion, creativity, research and incredibly inspiring visions of New Zealand’s space future. We’re so excited to watch our Space Up! student members bring this space future to life as the future space leaders of Aotearoa New Zealand.
A huge thank you to the following sponsors for supporting our Space Up! 2023 Essay Competition:
CHECK OUT THE SERIOUSLY COOL PRIZES OUR WINNERS RECEIVE!
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CHECK OUT THE SERIOUSLY COOL PRIZES OUR WINNERS RECEIVE! 〰️
WINNERS
NASA (authentic) flight jacket
NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander LEGO Set
Space Up! Merch kit: T-shirt, tote bag, patch, sticker
Fisher Space pen (use in zero-gravity, upside down, or under water!)
WINNER’S SCHOOL
2 WISANZ mentors will travel to winner’s school to present prize and give an exciting presentation about their career path!
RUNNERS UP
Fisher Space pen (use in zero-gravity, upside down, or under water!)
NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander LEGO Set
Space Up! Merch kit: T-shirt, tote bag, patch, sticker
SPOT PRIZES
Spot prizes of Space Up! patches will be drawn across all members who submit an essay
And here’s the information and resources Space Up! members had to help them develop their inspiring essays:
Setting the lunar scene…
NASA is preparing to return humans to the Moon through its Artemis Programme missions, and in 2025 people will land back on the lunar surface for the first time in over 55 years, including the first woman and first person of colour. In the years that follow, NASA plan to work with international partners to establish a long term presence on the Moon that will see astronauts living and working from a lunar base.
A lunar base where astronauts can live for longer missions will allow technology and operations to be developed that will eventually be used for human exploration on Mars. Longer stays on a lunar base will also help engineers and scientists to develop ways for humans to live and work on Mars, including looking after astronauts’ health and coming up with new types of food or ways to grow food away from Earth. A lunar base can also open up opportunities for new scientific investigations, including new ways to investigate the Solar System and Universe taking advantage of being out of Earth’s atmosphere or away from all the ‘noise’ of Earth radio frequency transmissions.
We have put together some Resources (in the section below) for you to learn more about NASA’s plan for the types of activities, engineering and science that could be happening to help explore the Moon from a lunar base.
Image credit: NASA
Who will be living and working on the Moon in 2053?
It takes many kinds of people to get to the Moon and to stay there. Some women right here in New Zealand are working on research or have space jobs that could one day help support a human presence beyond the Earth, could help explore the Moon or Mars, or would benefit from a permanent presence on the Moon. We will introduce you to some of these women and their research through our July and August monthly Space Showcases and also with videos we will post here on our website and in the Space Up! Community Forum. We’ll also provide additional Resources (below) about the Moon and NASA’s Artemis Programme. You might also like to do your own research about all the science and technology that might be developed to help humans live on the Moon and explore even further.
Competition Question:
Here was the task!
Imagine that you are a scientist, engineer or astronaut on Lunar Base Kiwi in 2053. In a 300-500 word essay, explore one of these topics:
What excites you about living and working at Lunar Base Kiwi?
What would you tell Kiwis back home about how your work at Lunar Base Kiwi helps the advancement of science?
What are some of the challenges that you experience at Lunar Base Kiwi, and how do you overcome them?
What is a typical day like at Lunar Base Kiwi?
There was one grand prize winner and one runner up in each of two year group categories:
Students in Years 9-10; and,
Students in Years 11-13
How to enter:
Entries for the 2023 Space Up! Essay Competition are now closed - and our winners have been announced!
Check back in 2024 for all the details for the Space Up! 2024 Essay Competition
Resources
There has been a lot of thinking by NASA and other scientists and engineers from around the world about what sort of activities could be enabled by a permanent presence on the Moon - both to help develop ways for humans to live longer in space and to further explore and understand our Solar System and Universe, including preparing for human exploration of Mars.
NASA have published a Lunar Exploration Plan that can give you a good idea of some of the early activities that NASA would like to undertake on a lunar base - you might like to read NASA’s thinking and then imagine how these activities could develop even further after 10 or 20 or 30 years of humans on the Moon.
(The full text of NASA’s Lunar Exploration Plan is quite long - but we’ve also provided a cut down ‘excerpt’ of this plan relevant to sustaining a lunar human presence - you can read both at the links below).
Women Space Role Models and their career fields on the Moon
Women working in space career fields in Aotearoa New Zealand today across science and engineering could contribute to establishing a permanent human and robotic presence on the Moon, or technology or science they work on could be further developed on the Moon to help humans live and work in space longer, could be developed to help humans to explore Mars, or could use a lunar base to further explore our Universe.
Below you’ll find videos of some incredible women space role models talking about how their field of space expertise might be advancing on Lunar Base Kiwi in 2053 , to give you some ideas to think about for your essay of what scientists and engineers at Lunar Base Kiwi could be working on in 2053.
We’ll also had LIVE chats with women space engineers and scientists in our Space Up! Monthly Space Showcase & Quiz nights - We kicked off our Lunar showcases with Betina Pavri, an amazing space engineer who previously worked at NASA JPL on the Mars Curiosity Rover.
Betina Pavri - Senior Principal Engineer, Paihau-Robinson Research Institute and previous NASA JPL engineer.
Watch our chat with Betina, Senior Principal Engineer at Paihua-Robinson Research Institute, and previously an engineer at NASA working on interplanetary robotic exploration missions, including the Mars Curiosity rover, below:
Dr Sarah Kessans - Biochemist, Microgravity Researcher & Senior Lecturer, University of Canterbury.
Watch our chat with Sarah, a biochemist and microgravity researcher whose research includes developing alternative foods for long duration space missions. You won’t believe what Lunar Base Kiwi crew could be eating on the moon in 2053!
Dr Michele Bannister - Astronomer & Planetary Scientist, University of Canterbury.
Watch our chat with Michele, as she talks about her research to understand the formation of worlds and how geological exploration of the Moon can help understand the formation of Earth - and help us further understand our place in the Universe.
The boring bit (Terms & Conditions)
Entrant eligibility: Entrants must be a Space Up! member, enrolled at a New Zealand high school (meeting all eligibility criteria set out in the Space Up! High School Club Terms and Conditions)
One entry per entrant (person), per year group category.
Year group categories are 1. Years 9-10, 2. Years 11-13, where Years are New Zealand high school year levels.
Entry eligibility:
a.Entries must be received by Women in Space Aotearoa New Zealand (WISANZ) at via email at spaceup@womeninspace.co.nz by 5pm on Sunday 8th October 2023. Entries must be in either Word document or PDF file format and must contain entrant’s name.
b. Entries must be original work of the entrant. Plagiarism as reasonably determined by the WISANZ Committee will render entries ineligible. Artificial Intelligence (AI) generated content within entries as reasonably concluded by the WISANZ Committee (such as content generated using ChatGPT) will render entries ineligible. Determination of content rendering entries ineligible is at the discretion of the WISANZ Committee and will be advised to entrants via email. Ineligible entries will not be put forward for judging for prizes.
The winning entries will be decided by the WISANZ Committee.
Prizes: One Winner and one Runner Up prize will be awarded in each of the year group categories. One Winner’s School Prize will be awarded to the high school attended by the Winner of each of the year group categories.
a. Winner’s Prize: NASA flight jacket, Lego Apollo 11 Lunar Lander set, Fisher space pen, Space Up! merchandise kit (t-shirt, patch, tote bag, sticker).
b. Winner’s School Prize: 2 WISANZ Mentors will travel to Winner’s school to present prize to Winner and provide career/inspiration presentation to any student, school and/or community groups as mutually agreed between the Winner’s school and the WISANZ Committee.
c. Runner Up Prize: Lego Apollo 11 Lunar Lander set, Fisher space pen, Space Up! merchandise kit (t-shirt, patch, tote bag, sticker).
Prize winners, and their school, will be notified by WISANZ no later than 23 October 2023.
WISANZ will work with Winners’ schools to arrange WISANZ Mentor presentation of Winner’s prizes and career talk to student groups, as mutually agreed. WISANZ Mentor presentation of prizes and career presentation to schools will only be arranged for schools of Winners of the two year group categories. Presentations at Winner’s school will be scheduled preferably during the week beginning 23 October, but may be arranged on any date as mutually agreed by the WISANZ Committee and Winners’ schools. Runners up prizes will be delivered via mail or courier to addresses agreed with Runners up in advance.