Join Us

BLUEsat is currently facing an acute shortage of active members working in various areas. A student project such as BLUEsat has a relatively high turnover rate simply because students get bogged down in their studies, graduate, or find a girlfriend/boyfriend and subsequently disappear. Furthermore, the systems of BLUEsat are fairly complex and require some level of knowledge that most people do not acquire until the end of their second year at Uni (in Engineering at least). Juniors tend to be overwhelmed by the burden and quickly shy away. We are generally looking for students completing their second year and are interested in the project, perhaps even in some key area, and are willing to devote their time and effort to the project. Students who have some knowledge in various areas of engineering, accumulated through interest, and are willing to learn more while helping build BLUEsat for the fun of it are more than welcome to join in even first year!

People who join BLUEsat often go on to do their BE thesis on some part of the satellite that they are working on. We would be pleased if students from other faculties considered the challenge of taking up a thesis involving BLUEsat too.

Note however that being a member of BLUEsat necessarily requires significant investment of time and effort, borne of interest and self-motivation. If you feel that you can only dedicate, say, 5 hours a week of work to BLUEsat (session times - ease off, exam time - exempt), then I'm afraid it will be hard for us to accomodate this. We need people who are whole-heartedly driven to complete and launch the satellite; experience has shown that where this is not true, people hold up the rest of the team and weaken the BLUEsat push in various ways.

If you have got this far without being too put off, then you should think about it, come down to the Groundstation and talk to us, or email us to discuss it. BLUEsat can provide you that sense of direction that you may have been lacking on reaching Uni. You will find a group of people just like you, and in time make a sizeable group of good friends.

Some hints (NOT requirements) that might indicate that you should join us:

• You are reading this page
• You read through several pages in the Satellite Subsystems tree, and feel like you want to be a part of it
• You have already/would like to read through all of the pages in the Satellite Subsystems tree
• You think space is an stimulating industry to work in, and you follow up on reports of spacecraft in the media
• You are constantly thinking about ideas, things to build or create
• You think you lack what some people call "a life" or a significant other, and often feel bored or spend your time doing things while feeling that you could be doing more
• You think that having a piece of your work circling the earth in space every hour and a half for many years to come is an achievement, and that you would like to work hard towards it

BLUEsat needs people, from a variety of faculties:

• Engineering
  Engineering is the raison d'etre of the project and its driving force. BLUEsat has several engineering projects just waiting for new people to get cracking on, for example the Imager payload and Telemetry subsystem. Our current members are working flat out in several areas each, focussing on the core satellite, and there is still much to be completed to meet our timelines. Should non-critial objectives not receive the attention they require, they will either be constructed by current members following the completion of their current work, or will be scrapped from the satellite altogether in order to meet the launch deadlines. Current students are working overtime, and now more than ever, BLUEsat needs dedicated engineers.

  And then there are the fields where Engineers don't usually do a good job:

• Finances & Accounting
  We need students to keep tabs on our cash reserves and keep track of our spending. People to manage budgets and spreadsheets, and liase with Schools and Faculties and Banks. People who would like to represent the University and BLUEsat, go out and seek sponsorship and see that our outfit is always in the black, and watch the engineers weave their magic.
• Human Resources & Resource Management
  BLUEsat needs people dedicated to managing databases of information, to keeping our computing and other facilities operational and updated, and maintaining this website. We also need people to help us get the right people to get us there. If you think this is your calling, drop us a line, we need you!
• Public Relations
  Never before have we needed people as badly in this area as we do now. Our launch is slated for May 2005, satellite integration will be well underway by the end of the year. Meanwhile we need people to organize the launch event and push BLUEsat into the University and media spotlight. The BLUEsat launch will be a once-in-a-generation event; the last (also the first) satellite launched by an Australian university was the Australis OSCAR 5, in January 1970 by a similar student outfit at the University of Melbourne. BLUEsat in comparison is a big-ticket event in this day. There is plenty of planning, advertising and logistics to be done, and we need your help.
• Management
  Management calls for leadership to lead the myriad divisions of BLUEsat. There are several levels of project management in the project, and students take up positions based on elections at the Annual General Meeting(s). Usually it is most headstrong and capable member of a team that becomes the leader and is charged with the task of seeing the team's objectives realized. However, people are often fully burdened with their BLUEsat and other work to take on further responsibility and an uneasy void sometimes needs to be filled. Join the project, join a team or division and show what you can do. Give BLUEsat what you can, and in time rise to take up roles of leadership.

Regardless of what you do in BLUEsat, one thing is certain: you will learn a lot about space technology and the industry. This is a once-in-lifetime opportunity; it is unlikely that you will again come across the chance to experience and receive what you will from working on BLUEsat. Finally, active involvement in BLUEsat will help in finding work in the space industry, and will just plain look good on your resumé.

It is a special kind of person that the BLUEsat team is composed of. Hopefully you will know whether you wish to be one of us, and we'd love to welcome you aboard.

	Author: Vaenthan Thiru © The Author, the BLUEsat project or UNSW. All rights reserved. Last Modified: August 28 2005 10:43:55.