From Armenia to the Stars: Help Aleksandr Study at WPI

Hello, my name is Aleksandr – an Armenian Engineer with a strong passion for space and a desire to bring positive change to Armenia and the world as a whole.

I have recently been accepted into Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s (WPI) Master of Science program in Aerospace Engineering. As part of the visa application process, I am required to show proof that I can cover the first year of tuition and living expenses at WPI equal to $46,980. Thanks to personal funds and support from family members I was able to cover a sizable amount of this fee, however, I still face a gap of $20,000 which I am hoping to fill with your support.

To help you better understand what this acceptance means to me, I will include a little backstory.

Ever since I was a kid, I have been fascinated by what is beyond our atmosphere. From imaging nebulas with my father when I was little to mixing solid rocket fuel in high school which burned my mother’s favorite table, I have always had this drive within me to explain the unexplainable and create things. That feeling led me to pursue a degree in Engineering Sciences at the American University of Armenia (AUA).

Throughout my education at AUA, I have worked with various diverse groups on a plethora of projects both pertaining to coursework and extracurricular interests. Despite not having many resources at my disposal, I learned to think creatively and innovate with whatever was at hand. This showed me that fancy equipment and state-of-the-art labs can be of immense help in projects, but one is not limited in their absence. I consistently apply this acquired knowledge to both every day and research problems I face, giving me that push to think outside the box and a perspective of unconventional thinking and problem-solving. This way of thinking combined with the education I have received during my undergraduate studies were the foundation of many of my achievements as a professional, and as a person.

During my final year at AUA, I was working on optimizing Hybrid Rocket Engine combustion through controlled oxidizer flow dynamics as part of my capstone project. My supervisor Dr. Hrachya Kocharyan and I have successfully published the results of my research in the Aerospace Science and Technology scientific journal. During the past year I have been helping a peer researcher Maria Khodaverdian in publishing her paper on multi-UAV formation flight by performing hardware-in-the-loop simulations to validate her controller.

My most significant achievement, however, is that for the past two and a half years I have been working as a Systems Engineer with the teams at CSIE and Bazoomq Space Research Laboratory on the first domestic Armenian CubeSat “HAYASAT” which was launched into low earth orbit via a Falcon 9 rocket on the 1st of December in 2023.

I was responsible for the attitude determination instrumentation payload onboard the satellite as well as the satellite EPS, and I am the designated operator for these systems. Working on the satellite showed me how my theoretical interests in control and propulsion can be intertwined into an anthropogenic device that zips around the low Earth orbit gathering and transmitting useful data.

But most importantly, it made one of the biggest dreams of the kid who looked at the night sky with his dad into reality. That kid eventually got to build something that went to space, but also became a huge boost for his homeland to be one step closer to space.

And now I am standing in front of a whole different set of possibilities. My goal is to further develop myself as a specialist and return home to Armenia with more than a few tools at my disposal. Working on “HAYASAT” ignited a fire within me to further develop professional and technical capabilities of Armenia in the space sector. There are so many other dreams of me as a kid that I now need to realize, each of which will be focused at helping Armenia, and hopefully humanity.

All of this, I am hoping to do with your help. Your contributions to this GoFundMe campaign will directly support my studies at WPI, which will allow me to bring knowledge, capabilities, and opportunities which can help Armenia in the near future!

To view my WPI acceptance letter, please use this link: https://linktr.ee/Aleksandr_Hakobyan

I thank everyone for their time, and express my utmost gratitude.

With hope,

Aleksandr Hakobyan