BRASHER — The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is always looking for interns, and that includes area students who are interested in the future of space exploration.
That was part of the message shared by NASA Network Integrity Officer Jena Garrahy and NASA Engineer Nikki Desch during presentations Thursday to St. Lawrence Central High School students.
Ms. Garrahy noted that Clarkson University alumnus Michael Sarafin serves as Artemis mission manager at NASA Headquarters, and one of their goals is to “try to get more resources up here and get some interns.”
“It’s an exciting time at NASA. It’s the Artemis generation,” the Norwood native said. “We want to highlight the kids in the north country because they have more grit and determination than I’ve seen as I’ve gone across the country.”
Ms. Desch attended Syracuse University for electrical engineering and enjoyed Robotics while in high school.
“I got interested in engineering and somehow ended up working at NASA, and now I work for Jena and it’s awesome, and I can’t wait to tell you guys about all the jobs we have available. I hope you are all interested in at least reaching out to us and talking to us about what opportunities we have for you,” she said.
Ms. Garrahy said she wasn’t a top student in high school.
“Academics was important. I tried hard, but I wasn’t an A student. I have a couple of degrees. None of them are in STEM, but I am in a STEM field. And I’m here to prove the fact that you can be a phenomenal student and an engineer and you can work at NASA. You could not be a phenomenal student and not be an engineer and you can work at NASA. They want people with a drive and a passion for whatever it is that you do,” she said.
Interns play an important role, she said.
“They’re not getting me coffee or getting my dry cleaning. They’re working with us on day-to-day things. We had a major intrusion several years ago. I brought my intern out to the West Coast with me to do forensic analysis with the FBI and Homeland Security. They didn’t obviously know what they were doing, but they got to view and observe what other professionals got to do on a day-to-day basis. So, our interns truly jump in with us and work with us,” Ms. Garrahy said.
And, she said, there are plenty of jobs to choose from. Of the 17,000 NASA employees, only 62 of them are astronauts.
“There are as many blue collar as there are white collar jobs at NASA. There are as many mechanics as mechanical engineers. There are as many forklift drivers as there are security professionals. We have social media, we have outreach people, we have HR, we have lawyers, we have contract specialists,” she said. “We take juniors and seniors and then we take all the way up through college. If this is something that you’re ever interested in, Nikki and I are your ambassadors. We got helping hands getting up through to where our careers are today, and we’re here to provide that helping hand to you guys.”
But, Ms. Garrahy had some words of advice for anyone who might be interested in an internship or working with NASA — watch your step on social media.
“Employers are looking at your social media. And a lot of these kids, they’re not getting the internships and they’re not getting these jobs. They think, ‘Oh, it’s just a snapshot in time just being goofy. It’s just going to be in high school and does not really affect me when I go into the real world.’ When I go to choose my interns, I absolutely look at their social media. When I hire new people in my office, I absolutely check out what they’re writing about,” she said.
Ms. Garrahy and Ms. Desch played a video from NASA Administrator Bill Nelson to give students an idea of what was ahead in the future for space exploration.
“No Herculean effort is too large. No moonshot is beyond our reach,” he said in the video. “This generation stands ready, ready to return humanity to the moon, and then to take us farther than ever before to Mars. Let us continue the quest to unfold this universe, and let us continue to find unity in our discovery.”
NASA has come a long way since man first headed out to explore the universe, Ms. Garrahy said.
“My parents were of the Apollo generation. And now you guys are in the Artemis. The head of the program that is taking the first woman and the first person of color to the moon is a Clarkson grad and a farm boy from Herkimer. And we’re from upstate new York, too, so this just goes to prove that us upstate New York, Northern New York kids can definitely contribute to NASA’s mission,” she said.
Ms. Garrahy said she and Ms. Desch provide “mission comm” to all of NASA’s satellites and the International Space Station.
“We have 24 by seven, 365 days a year availability to our astronauts. The International Space Station travels 17,500 miles per hour and we have to make sure that we have constant communication with it at all times. When one of our astronauts needs to call and order flowers for his wife, which happened a couple of weeks ago, if one of the astronauts wants to order her kids a pizza, she can pick up the phone and call Earth and order it. It’s crazy to think about,” she said.
“My job in particular is to make sure that our networks are safe. I’m overseeing the cybersecurity program for all of NASA’s mission comm, so keeping the bad guys out of our network and making sure that we constantly have the networks flowing,” Ms. Garrahy said.
Ms. Desch said she works specifically on Artemis Two, which will be the first crewed mission back to the moon. Artemis One launched last year.
“It will be landing on the moon, but it will be doing a nice orbit around in preparation to check out the capsule in preparation for the Artemis Three mission, which will actually land on the moon and start building up a sustainable habitat up there,” she said.
She said they want to have high-definition video from lunar distances that can be seen on earth in real time.
“We can’t do that with the current technology or what has been different technology used for communicating at lunar distances. So, instead of using a regular radio frequency, what we’re going to be using instead is lasers. We will actually be transmitting data and communication and video streams over by using infrared lasers from the Orion capsule back to earth, and I’m responsible for building up the ground stations that will be receiving that signal,” Ms. Desch said.
NASA has ground stations around the world.
“I just got back from Canberra, Australia a couple of months ago. About a year-and-a-half ago I went to South Korea to the ground station there. I’ve been to Madrid, Spain. Actually, I’ve been to all of them except for Antarctica because I grew up in Norwood and I’m done with snow, so that’s a hard pass for me. We go and make sure that we are able to go to these facilities and make sure everything is functioning so that when Artemis is launched again, or any of our other critical missions, that all of our equipment is maintained and we’re able to do the job,” she said.
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