Through this new partnership, Firefly Academy will introduce students to hands-on rocket engineering and multidisciplinary collaboration earlier in their academic careers. Philip Varghese, professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics in the Cockrell School of Engineering, will serve as the faculty advisor for The program will be open to all UT students regardless of their field of study, giving hundreds of graduate and undergraduate engineers a rare opportunity to participate in the construction of a full-scale, liquid-fueled rocket.
The University of Texas at Austin and Firefly Academy, a nonprofit organization run by Austin-based firm Firefly Aerospace, have partnered to establish - a $1 million, multi-year program that, for the first time, will offer UT students the opportunity to design, develop and assemble an industrial-scale rocket capable of launching to the edge of space.