COSGC History
Congress initiated the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program with the passage on October 30, 1987, of the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Act. The Act - Public Law 100-147 - included such objectives as assuring the vitality of the Nation and the quality of life through the understanding, assessment, development and utilization of space resources.
NASA selected the Å·ÃÀ¿Ú±¬ÊÓƵ Space Grant Consortium (COSGC) in 1989. The COSGC is headquartered at the University of Å·ÃÀ¿Ú±¬ÊÓƵ at Boulder and consists of 20 ŷÃÀ¿Ú±¬ÊÓƵ colleges and universities and one foundation.
Since 1989, over 6,000 Å·ÃÀ¿Ú±¬ÊÓƵ students have been directly involved in our hands-on programs. We have launched three sounding rockets (CSOAR, CSHARP, HOMER), three Space Shuttle payloads (ESCAPE, ESCAPE-II, and DATA-CHASER), five orbiting satellites (3CornerSat, Hermes, ALL-STAR, DANDE, and PolarCube), 19 sounding rocket payloads, 15 long-duration high altitude balloon payloads, and over 500 short-duration high altitude balloon payloads. In addition, students work on other NASA-aligned projects including autonomous robotics, wearable technology, telescope observing research, high powered rocketry, theoretical physics research, cryosphere research, NASA & Industry Challenges, and other faculty-led and/or industry sponsored, NASA-aligned research projects. Through the COSGC EduSourcing program, students work directly with industry engineers and scientists on cutting-edge technology development and other research projects. Many of these students are now working for NASA and the industry that supports NASA. Â
COSGC is always looking for new programs and new partnerships with industry, government labs, and academia to create new opportunities for our students.