April 1, 2010: Our Town – OWU

OWU students visited the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Sagamihara campus over spring break as part of Professor Bob Harmon’s Sagan Fellows course. They were hosted on the tour by Professor Seiichi Sakamoto, Director for Space Science Outreach at Sagamihara. Behind the group is an actual M-V Rocket, the world's largest solid propellant launch vehicle. Shown here are, from left, Anthony Harper, Harmon, Sakamoto, Eric Tran, David Kah Sing Soo, Sarah Rice, Waseda University student Atuhiro Kawakami, Nathan Kafity, and Waseda University Professor Satoshi Inaba.

Photo by Elaine Chun

Expanding Their Universe
OWU students visit Japan as part of Sagan Fellows experience

Ask the students enrolled in professor Bob Harmon’s Sagan Fellows class whether they would sign up for another of Ohio Wesleyan University’s new hands-on learning Sagan experiences, and everyone nods an enthusiastic yes.

The students traveled to Japan from March 6-13 as part of Harmon’s Physics 100.1 course, “International Competition and Cooperation in the Exploration of Space.” While there, they toured facilities of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) – Japan’s version of NASA.

Some of their most memorable moments involved watching JAXA engineers prepare the Venus Climate Orbiter for its May launch to study the second planet from the Sun and seeing full-scale models of other Japanese space probes and rockets.

For Anthony Harper, a sophomore from Westerville, Ohio, the experience made class discussions about future space exploration more focused and relevant.

“It was interesting to see the space probe (Venus Climate Orbiter) being worked on,” says Harper, a politics and government and economics double major. “And to see the rocket models. The experience helps to tie things together.”

Those classroom discussions include whether future space exploration should include manned missions, such as America’s celebrated 1969 moon landing, or consist only of unmanned missions, such as Japan’s upcoming Venus visit.

“The cost of elaborate life-support systems needed for manned missions is substantial,” Harmon says, “meaning that careful consideration is needed to decide whether the additional scientific and other benefits are worth the cost.”

So should America have sent men to the moon 40 years ago?

David Kah Sing Soo, a senior from Malaysia, thinks it was a necessary response to the success of the Soviet Union’s Sputnik 1, the world’s first artificial satellite.

“It was necessary for prestige,” says Soo, an economics management and mathematics-computer science double major. “For the United States, being second implied being second in everything else, too.”

And as for President Obama’s proposal to cancel the Constellation Program – NASA’s human spaceflight program?

Eric Tran, a senior from Rochester, N.Y., thinks Obama’s proposal has merit.

“The Cold War created a chess competition,” says Tran, a physics major and mathematics-computer science minor. “The current space program is a product of the Cold War, and the Constellation Program isn’t necessarily the best use of resources.

Sarah Rice, a senior astrophysics major from Afton, N.Y., agrees, noting that she’s surprised at some of the space-exploration issues that haven’t been resolved in nearly half a century.

“It’s interesting to see how space exploration got where it is today,” Rice says. “And somewhat surprising that more than 40 years after the moon landing, we’re still trying to sort out space policy. We still don’t have solid definitions or exploration protocols.”

In addition to these issues, Professor Harmon says, the class has lots of discussion about space-related articles in the news, including commercial ventures. In theory, such ventures leave NASA free to focus more on pure science and bring entrepreneurial dollars into the mix. He called everyone’s opinions on future space exploration – including his own – “opinions in progress” as the class learns more and more.

But one topic on which everyone agreed was the wonderful experience the OWU group had in Japan.

“The trip provided more than educational opportunities,” says Nathan Kafity, a first-year student from Huron, Ohio.

“It was really interesting to see cultural differences,” continues Kafity, a pre-medicine and biology double major. “Japan is a much more formal society. People treat each other with high respect.”

The society also seems more open and trusting, says Rice and Elaine Chun, Harmon’s wife and assistant manager of OWU’s audiovisual services department.

For example, although the legal drinking and smoking age is 20 in Japan, vending machines that dispense beer or cigarettes (without requiring IDs) are very plentiful on the Tokyo streets. A wide variety of food and other drinks also are available from machines readily accessible on the city streets, Chun says.

While in Japan, the Ohio Wesleyan group saw some old friends and also made some new ones, Harmon notes.

Alumna Junghyun Ryu, a 2006 graduate and former admission counselor, now lives in Tokyo with her husband. “J” met the group for dinner, giving her a chance to say hello to everyone, especially Rice and Tran, whom she worked with during the admission process.

The group also spent time with Satoshi Inaba, a professor at Japan’s Waseda University and its School of International Liberal Studies. Inaba spent a month at Ohio Wesleyan last year, learning more about OWU’s unique liberal arts curriculum. For more than 20 years, Ohio Wesleyan and Waseda students have participated in an exchange program arranged through the Japan Study program at Earlham College.

Harmon says Inaba was invaluable in coordinating the JAXA tour and helping the Ohio Wesleyan students get the most out of their international experience. And, if that weren’t enough, Harmon concedes, “He was also the best karaoke singer.”

Harmon’s Physics 100.1 class is one of six new Sagan Fellows classes being held this spring, all featuring experiences designed to connect theoretical classroom learning with real-world occurrences and opportunities. The courses are an extension of the fall 2009 Sagan National Colloquium speaker series, which brought world-renowned experts to campus to discuss “Renewing America for a Global Century: From Theory to Practice at Ohio Wesleyan University.”

– Cole Hatcher

Workers at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) help to prepare the AKATSUKI spacecraft, also known as Venus Climate Orbiter, for its May launch. The box-shaped orbiter in the center will be sent into orbit around Venus to study the planet’s climate.

Photo by Elaine Chun