This summer, aerospace engineering student Kaley Hassell participated in the Brooke Owens Fellowship Program. Now, she is encouraging other students to apply.
Hassell decided to apply for the Brooke Owens Fellowship program when she saw that it offered opportunities to work with amazing aerospace companies. She said, “the program is absolutely amazing for undergraduate women in aerospace.” Applications for the fellowship are open, and they close on November 12th.
As a selected fellow, Kaley Hassel worked with the engineering department at Sierra Nevada Corporation on the Dream Chaser spacecraft. She also got the opportunity to work with astronauts and CEOs.
Part of the Brooke Owens Fellowship Summit was the grand challenge presentation held in Washington D.C. “All of us were divided into groups and solved a grand challenge-or humanity’s next biggest feat,” Hassell said. “We got to present and network with a lot of cool people! We were tasked with solving how we could create a collaborative lunar economy. It was a lot of fun.”
Part of the Fellowship is being assigned a professional mentor. “Mine was Mr. Tory Bruno, CEO of the United Launch Alliance,” Hassell said. “It was really awesome getting to know and learn from him. He even invited me to observe mission control on the recent AEHF5 launch on August 8th!”
Kaley Hassell’s Experiences
NASA Administrator Mr. Jim Bridenstine keynote spoke to the Brookies at one of the fellowship dinners. “It was really cool,” Hassell said. “I learned a lot about how policy goes into the aerospace world and even got to ask him a question face to face!”
Hassell said the Brookies are definitely a family. She got to make some great connections with women from around the world who are passionate about making a change in the world of aerospace.
They also got to have a fireside chat with NASA Chief of Staff Janet Karika.
They also got to meet Oklahoma Representative Kendra Horn, and have a fireside chat with her about different space issues as well as learn from her successes and experience.
Kaley Hassell and her friend Ivy (another Brookie) with the Dream Chaser spacecraft. “I worked in the Systems Engineering department, solving problems and integrating between different systems,” Hassell said.
Pictured is the Brookie Class of 2019 at the Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum. The Discovery space shuttle is in the background. “It was really cool to see it in person since I was basically working on a mini version of the Shuttle at SNC this summer!” Hassell said.
