With the recent successful launch of the Artemis II rocket, all eyes seem to be back on the heavens, with space activity only planned to increase over the next few years. Space travel and exploration was long something framed just for men, until Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space and Sally Ride the first American woman.Â
My first career aspiration, after the classic ballet dancer and gymnast dream, was to become an astronaut. My idol was Scott Kelly, on whom I gave a whole cereal-box presentation to my fourth-grade class, which involved pasting pictures of my key talking points onto the cereal box. He spent a year in space on the ISS (International Space Station), while his twin brother stayed on Earth so that the effects of zero gravity on the human body could be studied. While that was undoubtedly not the incredible speech I thought it would be, it got me hooked on space and space exploration. I would tour the ISS on my classroom computer, zipping through the tight corridors using Google Earth.Â
While my space dream unfortunately fizzled out due to several factors – due in part to my ineptitude at anything mathematical, claustrophobia, and lack of desire to join any branch of the military to acquire the necessary piloting experience – space never fully left my brain. With what appears to be a reinvigoration of the public’s interest in spatial exploration due to Artemis II being in the news, and planned exploration continuing beyond Artemis missions and, in theory, to Mars, space has never been more relevant.Â
To get to all of those places requires many things, but most of all, people. People to innovate, make the journeys, promote space exploration to the media, and so much more. Space is an industry, like any other, with typical corporate roles within organizations such as NASA and Blue Origin; thus, in theory, anyone can get involved at any level of space exploration. However, for the purposes of this article, we will focus on the career path that first captured my eight-year-old self’s attention: being an astronaut. And what better way to evaluate this career path, particularly for a woman, than using the most relevant example today: Christina Koch, who is thousands of miles away from Earth as I am writing this article.
Christina Koch’s background
Christina Koch was born in Michigan and grew up in North Carolina, attending North Carolina State University to receive her bachelor’s in electrical engineering and physics. She went on to earn her Master of Science degree in electrical engineering from the same university and studied abroad at the University of Ghana, also later receiving an honorary PHD from North Carolina State University.Â
This educational background highlights the hard work and specialization required to even be considered for selection as an astronaut. Koch didn’t just choose her field; she went on to demonstrate her commitment to it through her degree classifications, setting herself apart in terms of expertise.Â
With this educational background, Koch began her professional career, using her qualifications as a springboard. Another key factor in her background is her involvement in the space industry, starting from her first job. She started her career as an electrical engineer at NASA, working on instruments for NASA’s various space missions. She then took a slight detour in her career, into remote work, beginning as a Research Associate in the United States Antarctic Program, during which she stayed at the South Pole station for a year and a season at Palmer Station. Although her work during this time did not draw on her advanced technical background, as she served as a member of firefighting and Search-and-Rescue operations at the respective bases, she established a new facet of herself professionally: an ability to work in remote and incredibly hostile environments. Space, as we know, is the most hostile environment for humans, so this experience, although not in her professional field of space technology engineering, is nevertheless incredibly important to her being chosen as an astronaut.Â
Her career continued in the field of technology at Johns Hopkins University, where she served as an electrical engineer, working on space probes. She then continued her remote work at Palmer Station, Greenland, Alaska, and the American Samoa Observatory. With all this incredible experience under her belt, Koch reflected on how she got to being accepted as a NASA astronaut.Â
“I had a career that was twofold. I spent time in space science, working on NASA instruments, and I also worked as a field engineer and research assistant, exploring the most remote corners of the earth, including Antarctica. So I always tried to stay true to the things that drew me in from a young age. And eventually, NASA put out a call for astronauts. I looked at everything I had done and thought, yeah, I’m going to put my name in the hat and see if I’m someone who can contribute to that team. And I was extremely fortunate to be selected and achieve something I never thought I would.”
Koch today
As she described herself, what she offered from a career perspective was two-fold: academic and professional experience with the technologies involved in space exploration, as well as experience in remote environments simulating space. Although we will never know exactly why, Koch was accepted into the NASA astronaut program; her qualifications speak for themselves and paint an engaging, wildly impressive picture of the career she built for herself, making her a valuable choice for not only the astronaut training program but ultimately for the Artemis II mission.Â
Koch is now one of four humans who have traveled to the moon, and the only woman to do so. Her career was built on multi-faceted growth, demonstrating her personal strengths and intellectual capabilities through academics, research, and career opportunities. She didn’t attend an Ivy League university or Russell Group university, but through hard work, propelled herself further than any human has ever gone before – literally.