 You're looking at America's future. The Space Station Freedom will give us a permanent presence in space. This is also a view of our future. Hello, my name is Joseph Henderson. This summer I worked for Marshall Space Flight Center in the Information and Electronic Systems Laboratory of the Data Management Branch. This summer, Joe helped test this mechanism that could someday serve as Freedom's front door and parking space rolled into one. It's called the docking and berthing mechanism. Joe's knowledge of computers played a major role in completing his evaluation. Joe is not a NASA engineer. Not yet anyway. Joe is still in high school. But through the NASA Summer High School Apprenticeship Research Program, or SHARP, budding scientists and engineers are getting a unique hands-on opportunity in their chosen field. SHARP began with its first students in 1980 and since, more than 140 high school students have seized the SHARP opportunity. The primary goal is to offer underrepresented minority students the chance to participate in an intensive science and engineering apprenticeship program. 18-year-old Christine Penny worked in the Atomic Physics Lab. During her study, she designed and developed hardware which automated this vacuum ultraviolet calibration facility. On the side of this, the monochromator, which disperses the light, will be attached a metal motor bracket, which will have a motor that will turn the gears and change the wavelength of light using this knob automatically. 17-year-old Lemoine Humphrey, here with NASA's Jerry Hudgens, designed hardware which will permit precise movements of materials in a vacuum. I was assigned to do a package on the IGDS, which is behind me. It stands for the Interactive Graphics Design System. These three screw holes contain the counterboard. The counterboard is a half-drilled hole that enables the screw not to be on the surface of the bracket which I was designing. This is my mentor, James Blanche, and we are next to the Gerber PCA-100 computer which our branch makes printed circuit boards. I'm Jim Blanche. I've been involved with the SHARP program for five or six years. I think it's an excellent program. I have had some excellent students with us during that period. We have gotten a lot of help from them and I think they've gotten a great deal out of the program. Each student works with a mentor, a NASA scientist or engineer. Brian Chang wants to be a scientist. And during his study, he worked closely with NASA's Dr. Donald Frazier. His summer job gave him hands-on experience using holography and lasers for the purpose of testing a theory involving separation processes. Here, 16-year-old Julie Mai and her mentor, Dr. Steven Seuss, examined solar data. Julie worked with computers to create these digitized pictures of the Sun. These students worked an eight-week schedule at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Here are the requirements to qualify for SHARP. Each student must be a citizen of the United States. Parents cannot be employed by NASA, and the minimum age is 16. Each student will be required to write an abstract of his or her assigned project and a research paper upon completion of study. A newsletter is published with articles written by the students. This lets SHARP students NASA-wide share program experiences and project success stories. Students participate in other enrichment activities, lecture series, field trips, computer labs, and demonstrations. With your participation in SHARP, you enter a program that could lead to future NASA employment opportunities. Now let's hear from former SHARP students. Gwendolyn Artis trains astronauts at the Payload Crew Training Complex. When I participated in SHARP, it was during the summer of 1980. I had just completed my junior year of high school. I was one of the first participants in the program offered here at Marshall Space Flight Center. Now I'm a permanent employee of NASA. I'm working in the Payload Crew Training Complex at Marshall. We're responsible for training crew members on payloads aboard Space Lab. Our responsibility is the development of software models and hardware mock-ups of the experiments to fly aboard the Space Lab. I'm also participating in the Payload Operations Control Center, POTCADRY, where we monitor pre-launch, launch, and post-launch activities. Ricky Howard has always wanted to be an electrical engineer. SHARP prepared him for his career. When I came here in 1981, I was a SHARP student, and I really enjoyed the program. I thought it was a very interesting, useful, and stimulating program, something that was very good to do as a high school student. And I learned a lot from the experience. When I was a SHARP student, one of the projects I worked on led me into the field I'm working now, which is the field of computers controlling real-world objects. Right now I'm working for NASA in the control electronics branch, working on a autonomous or automated rendezvous and docking system. Basically, this system is going to be put on the orbital maneuvering vehicle and will then be used to go up and capture satellites to bring them either to the space station or back to the shuttle in the future. To find out more about this exciting summer program, please write CM22 George Newby Employee Development Specialist Personnel Office Marshall Space Flight Center, Alabama 35812 SHARP allowed me hands-on experience with high-tech equipment, exposure to the scientific and engineering world, and a head start for employment with NASA. This gave me a chance to see different areas of NASA and a lot of what goes on in the professional environment, something you don't normally get to see as a high school student. You usually have to wait until college or beyond. I encourage any student who has given the opportunity to participate in the program to take advantage. It worked for me. Being involved in the National Space Program is an idea that many students just dream about. For you, it can become a reality.