Did everyone miss the point that it's a colonization mission? The plan isn't to send them there to sit around, staring into the white martian sky and picking their noses until they die. Colonization means they are there to build infrastructure. Yea, they won't be coming back, but they'll be laying the foundation of civilization there, to be followed presumably by more colonists. Believe it or not, you can't just plop down entire cities and call it a new colony. It takes work, several generations of work, and you have to start somewhere. And while those people may be under qualified specifically for space flight, the process of building a new world of towns and roads takes many skillsets.