The need of space industry, space agencies and other space-related institutions to increase their performance drives human resources management to a growing effort in education and training of staff in a continuous learning process. To meet this demand, there has been a growth in postgraduate educational programs on space-related subjects, particularly in Europe and the United States. The offered programs differ substantially in scope and characteristics, coverage and focus, quality and organization, and, up until now, there has been no coordination of these activities. This paper introduces several individual programs which provide more or less integrated approaches to space education, providing e.g. systems engineering, business engineering and personal skills development. Furthermore, to implement coordination between existing programs, the recently initiated concept of a Virtual Space Academy is presented which will allow coordination of postgraduate space education and realize cross-fertilization between the programs to enhance and stimulate space education.
Space education is typically limited to Bachelor, Master and PhD programs at universities. This traditional setting can nowadays neither provide the quantity nor the quality of work force needed in the space sector. New approaches have to be implemented prior, within and beyond a purely academic curriculum to satisfy these needs. In this context, the training of professionals for a changing and evolving space sector is what is understood as post-graduate space education.
In 1995, the Delft University of Technology became the first European university to offer a Master degree in Space Systems Engineering, SpaceTech, as part of its post-graduate program. At the International Space University, over 2500 students have graduated since 1987. The international postgraduate master course in Space Exploration and Development Systems focuses on space exploration and the systems for its development. Furthermore, industrial training courses are continuously being advanced to cover the need, e.g. for systems engineers in companies such as EADS.
The Virtual Space Academy will harmonize these programs and activities. A minimum standardization of the courses and their contents is targeted without reducing their diversity. In that process, the feedback of the needs of industry and organizations, such as ESA and national space agencies are important to increase the quality and value of the education. Cooperation within the Virtual Space Academy will allow mutual access to academic resources, experience, laboratories and tools that would otherwise not be available to individual initiatives. Later on, the curricula can even be complemented with courses offered by partner organizations.
This paper provides an overview of postgraduate education and presents selected programs rooted at academia and industry. The programs are compared and analyzed in terms of their key characteristics. Finally, the mission and objectives of the recently initiated Virtual Space Academy are described. The initiative originated from a European nucleus but is open to international partners worldwide. The opportunities that the academy offers in providing a continuity of highly qualified space engineers and managers, maintaining a knowledge-base in line with current technology standards and trends, realizing cost savings through harmonization and cooperation within a virtual setting of the academy are also addressed.