Montgomery County Community College and Assistant Math Professor Christopher Scott Vaughen is giving students hands-on experience using the Kerbal Space Program—a space flight simulation video game—as a pilot program called the NASA KSP Math & Physics Lab.

KSP, developed and launched by Squad in 2011, involves a space program that has a crew of green humanoid aliens known as Kerbals.

Students get to design, construct and fly their own spacecraft using realistic physics and engineering equations.

“The video game is an opportunity to experience universal principles of math and physics in a way that is fun and interactive,” said Vaughen, who teaches all levels of math at MCCC, including calculus, differential equations and linear algebra.

MCCC previously received a five-year grant from NASA, allowing students to participate in several innovative engineering projects.

The projects included building a NASA Mars Curiosity Rover, the creation of a quadrotor, the development of a motor test bench, and the creation of a recovery device for a high-altitude balloon used by Temple University to film the total solar eclipse for NASA in near space altitude.

The current NASA grant covered the cost of the KSP video game for students as well as the fees for several guest speakers and the instructor. Fifteen students participated in the one-credit course, which was free for them.

For the program, Vaughen wrote a six-chapter workbook that covers rocket science and orbital mechanics from algebra through differential equations – all inspired by the KSP game.

“These topics are difficult to experience in practice, but with the Kerbal Space Program, you can truly engage with the concepts,” Vaughen said.

MCCC will be offering the course, MAT 199: The NASA KSP Math & Physics Lab, again for the spring semester.
For more information, contact Assistant Math Professor C. Scott Vaughen.

To read more about the MCCC math program and the NASA KSP Math & Physics Lab click here.