Karkhana—an education company and makerspace run by educators and technologists—has launched a space programme focused on satellites and space exploration—running three separate space-themed classes this year alone. The goal of the programme is to have Karkhana students build their own launch ready DIY picosatellites in the next 2 years.  As part of Karkhana Space programme, K_Space, a DIY gathering and workshop for space exploration, is being held in Kathmandu, Nepal from Oct 20-29. The workshop is being used as a platform for interdisciplinary collaboration between creative professionals and technologists.

K_Space is hosting 19 participants comprising educators, programmers, hackers, scientists, and artists, from Palestine, Cambodia, Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, India and Nepal. Throughout the workshop, they will be given number of hackathon-style challenges to create the best solutions for space education.

 Some of the prototypes of their workshops include water pressure rockets, full functioning weather antennas, DIY Yagi-Uda antenna and an Ardusat that is capable of carrying micro-bio organisms to space. The Karkhana team has yet to make a full-fledged curriculum from their intensive workshops to educate students in near future.  The objective of K_Space is to create a DIY Space exploration-focused open curriculum covering a range of subjects across math, science, engineering, technology, and creative arts that schools across South and South East Asia can implement.

The workshop is supported by the Danish Center of Culture and Development (CKU), the Open and Collaborative Science in Development Network (OCSDNet), and the Center for Social Development Studies, Chulalongkorn University as part of their projects which fund short workshops focused on Science and Open hardware.

The workshop will conclude with a two day exhibition running from Oct 28-29.