What the Space Academy Means for NASA, the Space Force, and the Industry

On August 28, 2026, at Johnson Space Center in Houston, President Trump announced his initiative to create a Space Academy to train future space professionals. The Executive Order, entitled “Establishing the United States Space Academy,” creates a commission to develop a plan to implement the new institution. In making his announcement, the president emphasized the importance of space to national security and then presented each of the Artemis II astronauts with the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. In creating the Space Academy, the executive order states that its purpose is to “strengthen the Nation’s space workforce by expanding opportunities to educate and develop the next generation of leaders across the space domain.”

The Road to the Space Academy

The order creates a presidential commission to build the framework for the new NASA-led academy. Specifically, the commission is charged to build out the “key details” of the new Academy, including governance, curriculum, service obligations of graduates, the selection process, and both existing and new legislative authorities required to establish it. The commission’s report to the president is due not later than 120 days from the order’s signing, or roughly late December of this year.

Unlike the Space Force itself, which was born from various reports and discussions going back as far as 2001, a dedicated Space Academy is a relatively new idea. The idea for a Space Academy associated with the Space Force first entered the public forum back in 2021 when, shortly after the USSF stood up, Senator Turberville (R-AL) asked then Chief of Space Operations General Jay Raymond if a separate service academy was warranted.

At the time, Raymond responded that just as the Marines commission via the Naval Academy, the Air Force Academy was the right for the USSF. The next time the idea for a Space Academy came up was in the Heritage Foundation’s “Mandate for Leadership,” a document that has largely been seen as a blueprint for the Trump Administration.

That document recommends that the Trump Administration "explore creation of a Space Force Academy to attract top aero-astro students, engineers, and scientists and develop astronauts." The idea of a “Space Force Academy” grew beyond a service academy for the Space Force and into the concept for the NASA-led and blended civilian-military Space Academy outlined in the president’s executive order.

What the Commission’s Report Might Look Like

The commission has a lot of work to do in a very short amount of time. While some details are bound to be worked out over the coming years, such as curriculum and selection criteria, the location of the new academy is likely to be a hot topic very soon. The president indicated he would be involved in that process, stating, “I'm going to be choosing a location very shortly."

In general, major mission site selection tends to be politically sensitive, which is why agencies such as DoD and NASA have disciplined objective processes to try to make the best site selection possible given the mission requirements. NASA’s own real estate processes are governed by NASA Program Regulation (NPR) 8800.15F, which outlines authorities and procedures for acquiring real estate. The commission’s report will likely suggest several sites as potential locations, as well as criteria for selecting the final site. However, just as the US Space Command headquarters location has been the subject of debate on Capitol Hill and the White House over three administrations, expect the same back and forth for the Space Academy.

The other major hurdle NASA and the White House will need to overcome is determining what can be done within existing authorities and what new legislation is required. The commission will outline what is required to implement the academy, and assuming new or amended legislation is needed, that will require a champion in Congress to sponsor and push through the new authorities. Space has been an area of bipartisan cooperation, with disagreements usually over scale and not on substance. The “new space race” with the Chinese to see who can claim the resource-rich lunar South Pole means an academy dedicated to accelerating the production of space professionals does not seem likely to find many detractors in Congress. The big fight will likely be over the cost to establish it and where it will land.

NASA Administrator Isaacman released a statement in parallel with the executive order and emphasized the mission of the new Space Academy:

"President Trump's vision for a new academy is a transformational step to educate the engineers, scientists, technicians, operators and even the astronauts who will be necessary for the inspiring future we are pursuing in space."

What About the Other Academies?

A Space Academy will take its place among the other service academies and the various commissioning sources for the uniformed services. For Space Force officers specifically, that now includes: USAFA, ROTC, and Officer Training School. Military astronauts are commissioned officers from the armed services and join the Astronaut Corps after many years on active duty. Civilian astronauts may or may not have served in the military, but come to the Astronaut Corps after a distinguished career in science, technology, medicine, or aviation.

The myriad of other professionals from construction, engineering, science, and astrophysics all come to the federal civil service via academia and industry. In short, there’s no single source for space professionals today, and a Space Academy will add another path to federal service in the space program.

Understanding how the new NASA-led Space Academy will fit into the existing ecosystem will undoubtedly be a necessary part of the presidential commission’s work. The presidential commission will likely begin by looking at how the federal government already trains and educates officers and specialists today when building their new academy. They will have a variety of choices. The United States has eight uniformed services with commissioned officers, with five of those being armed forces.

Alongside the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and Space Force (all DoD), and the Coast Guard (DHS), there are the NOAA Commissioned Officer Corps (Commerce Dept.) and the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps (HHS). Each of the eight uniformed services commissions its officers differently.

The service academies are well known to everyone: the Military Academy (West Point), the Naval Academy (Annapolis), and the Air Force Academy (Colorado Springs). The Coast Guard Academy in New London is less well known but rounds out the academies for the armed services. Lesser known is the Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point, NY, which is run by the US Maritime Administration. Neither NOAA nor USPHS has a school of their own; each takes college graduates and runs them through officer training following their graduation. NOAA’s officers go through twelve weeks of training at the Coast Guard Academy before heading to their first assignment as an ensign. The US Public Health Service direct-commissions physicians, nurses, engineers, and other professionals who already hold the credential the Corps needs. Just like the armed services, USPHS officers graduate from a brief orientation course before their first assignment. Of course, there is the Reserve Officers' Training Corps at most major universities, and the officer training and candidate schools as well.

Based on what is written in the executive order as to the scope and projected students at the Space Academy, it might look a lot more like Kings Point than Colorado Springs. As noted above, the Merchant Marine Academy might commission officers into the armed services as well as civilian service in the US Merchant Marine. Each year roughly 25-45% of the graduating class choose active-duty commissions, which might be how a Space Academy designed to build both USSF officers and civilian engineers and scientists might operate.

The Next 120 Days and Beyond

The commission's report is due by late December, and if they are able to complete all the tasks laid out in the executive order, it will be quite a document.

Even though the new academy will be led by NASA, as described in the executive order, it will serve the entire space enterprise - military and civilian. That means an interagency process, which is always an exercise in balancing often competing priorities, and then garnering congressional support for both authorities and funding. An interagency document in 120 days is already a tall order. Being prepared to go to Congress with a fleshed-out plan that will survive the legislative process is quite another thing entirely.

Once the report is delivered, there probably won’t be much action until Congress returns in January. While no members of Congress have weighed in just yet, the expectation that at least one house of Congress will flip to the Democrats complicates the way ahead if legislation is required. There are multiple committees with oversight responsibility, which will necessarily make the process slow and unpredictable.