Schubert, Peter J.2017-04-052017-04-052016-06Schubert, P. J. (2016, June), Mentored, Unpaid Design Team Internship Experience Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana. 10.18260/p.25710https://hdl.handle.net/1805/12193An international team of 7 undergraduate interns working pro bono during the summer made significant advances in several areas of Space Solar Power. Distinct from a capstone design effort, this study group revived the practice common in the 1970s and 1980s of considering broad topics of high relevance to public citizens and elected decision-makers. Significant obstacles to success included lack of research experience, lack of motivating paycheck, and a highly-complex system under study. Each student was assigned a mentor from the aerospace industry or academia to guide the creation of a research plan, and to periodically review progress. Team-building exercises were conducted to develop relationships, and weekly team workshops were held to teach interoperability with other subsystems. Student experiences shifted from excitement at the outset to a sense of being overwhelmed with the magnitude and difficulties associated with a space-based project running in the tens of billions of dollars. Yet, each student was able to overcome such mid-term concerns, and to make a meaningful contribution to a key research question. Their results were published at a national space conference with all students listed as co-authors. The present work assesses the formation of such an unpaid team and the management thereof, analyzes the techniques used to encourage desired outcomes, and finishes with post-project follow-up on perceptions and career choices. This approach may find interest among professors with limited funds who seek to develop solid preliminary data to make grant applications more competitive.enPublisher Policyundergraduate internshipsmentoringaerospace researchConference proceedings