NASA’s Recruitment For Mars, Do You Have What It Takes?

NASA released a series of mock posters, planning their eventual recruitment for colonizing Mars. The World War 2-style images are part of NASA’s public-outreach campaign to reinvigorate people’s enthusiasm for space travel. Unfortunately for some hopefuls, the window for actual astronaut recruiting ended in February.

NASA’s new Mars recruitment starts off with a promising message.

“Mars needs YOU! In the future, Mars will need all kinds of explorers, farmers, surveyors, teachers… but most of all YOU! Join us on the Journey to Mars as we explore with robots and send humans there one day. Download a Mars poster that speaks to you. Be an explorer!”

According to the NASA website, the space agency originally commissioned these images to show at the Kennedy Space Center in 2009 and released them to the general public as part of its “Journey to Mars” program.

The posters advertise for jobs currently not being considered in the Mars mission — including teachers, farmers, and surveyors — in order to envision a future where NASA is busy colonizing the Red Planet.

NASA currently looks at a variety of backgrounds for its astronaut program, just not quite that diverse. According to their last hiring news release, they said, “From pilots and engineers, to scientists and medical doctors, NASA selects qualified astronaut candidates from a diverse pool of U.S. citizens with a wide variety of backgrounds.”

When it comes to NASA’s vision for Mars colonization, nearly every field is needed.

As previously reported by the Inquisitr, NASA released a series of similarly retro posters for futuristic space tourism, a way of promoting the space agency’s exoplanet research program. Those posters promised tourists exciting prospects like experiencing the gravity of a super-Earth and enjoying the eternal night-life on the rogue planet PSO J318.5-22. But the Mars posters are about the work of colonizing a new world, not leisure.

They’re not entirely fiction either. As the Washington Post points out, the space agency is working hard to develop farming methods for Mars. They’ve even managed to grow flowering plants and will likely move on to delicate vegetables like tomatoes soon.

Overall, the goal of the Journey to Mars mission is to put someone on the Red Planet within 20 years.

For people looking to join up, there’s some bad news. The last hiring window for astronauts ended in February. The requirements were surprisingly low — anyone with a bachelor’s degree in a STEM field and three years of professional experience was eligible. But the actual standards for astronauts are most likely far above the basics, with about 18,300 candidates aiming to fill just a handful of positions.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden released a statement with the job announcements.

“This next group of American space explorers will inspire the Mars generation to reach for new heights, and help us realize the goal of putting boot prints on the Red Planet. Those selected for this service will fly on U.S. made spacecraft from American soil, advance critical science and research aboard the International Space Station, and help push the boundaries of technology in the proving ground of deep space.”

NASA’s Mars recruitment posters are available for download on their site here.

[Image via NASA/KSC]