WEBVTT

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My name is Stephanie Stilson, I work at the Kennedy Space Center, and I am the NASA vehicle manager for orbiter Discovery.

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Music.

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I work at the Kennedy Space Center, and I am the NASA vehicle manager for orbiter Discovery, and that means that

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I oversee the processing required to get the orbiter ready for a safe return to flight.

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The orbiter itself is a very complex vehicle, so there's always work to be done.

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There's a schedule of time that we're trying to allot work into. It takes a lot of planning and coordination.

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Obviously, we'll get back to flight as soon as we're ready. There's a lot of work that has to be scheduled to get there.

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And so I spend my time every day going through the schedule, ensuring we have the right jobs on the schedule and that we're getting everything

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accomplished that we need to, to be ready for flight.

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I began working for NASA as a cooperative education student while I was still in college.

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I was attending North Carolina State University, working on my degree in computer engineering. And the office that I started with as a co-op

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is the same office I'm in now.

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Now I've been around other places since then, it's just come around full circle, and now I'm back in the same office that I started in

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way back when.

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The person in my life that inspired me the most is my grandmother Stilson. We've always been very close, we still are.

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She's very active; 83 years old, she plays golf twice a week. I hope that when I'm that age that I'm as active as she is.

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She was always inspiring me by telling me I could do whatever I wanted. We used to spend summers together every summer up in the mountains,

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we had a cabin there.

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And we would read together, we would do crafts together, we would play sports and things, and she always made me feel that anything I wanted to do,

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she would help me get there.

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I can be a role model to both boys and girls, because I can show them if they pick something -- a goal in their life -- they can get there.

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Science and math are hard subjects, and they may feel that they can't achieve what they want to achieve because they're having a hard time.

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But if I can show them and talk to them and let them know that by working hard, they can get there,

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they can realize that they can achieve anything they want to do.

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To work for NASA, with NASA, with the Space Program, doesn't mean you have to be technically oriented.

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Doesn't mean you have to be in science or mathematics. There's people in, in every career position within NASA.

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If you enjoy writing and that's something that makes you happy, then pursue that and, and write things about the Space Program.

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Work for Public Affairs, where you can write articles and so forth. Don't feel that just because science and math doesn't turn you on

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that that means you can't be a part of the Space Program. And I think a lot of people,

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since the majority of the folks that work for NASA are engineers or scientists,

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they think that that's the pigeonhole they have to be in. And that's not true at all.

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Ever since I was a young girl, when I visited the Kennedy Space Center, I wanted to be an astronaut.

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So, as a lifetime achievement type goal, that's what I'd like to be.

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I'd like to have the opportunity. Now that's a very elite group of folks, it's very hard to become an astronaut,

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but I always have in the back of my mind and I try to improve myself, both through education and experience,

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so maybe one day I can be a part of that elite group.

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Music.

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