July 14th NASA's New Horizons Will Fly By Pluto (the Dwarf Planet *sigh*) Follow This Link For Front

One of my NASA mentors worked on BEAM. It's nuts to see something go from testing to orbit! #journeytomars

High School Women - Aspirations In Computing Award

Due November 7th!

High school women, check out the questions for the NCWIT Aspirations In Computing award, your qualification may surprise you! Seriously gals, apply. You will get internships/ job shadowing opportunities, access to college $$$ and most importantly meet peers with similar interests. This award made me look at computer science as a serious major, awarded me a new iPad and CAD software, gave me the opportunity to visit the white house to advocate for project based learning during a Champions of Change Event and encouraged me to attend Grace Hopper Computing Conference. At least look at the questions because you qualify more than you think, I promise. I talked on WDIO's Good Morning Northland about NCWIT Aspirations in Computing Award for high school women which may provide some insight. Teachers, relatives and friends of HS women, please encourage them to apply.

‪STEM is uniquely comprised of careers for every person with every desired lifestyle.

Internships - Beyond Your Project

Being a better intern by going beyond your project seeking career and professional growth:

https://umdcareers.wordpress.com/2016/08/17/internships-beyond-your-project/

Holding the NASA Meatball (their circular logo). The red print NASA logo is called the worm.

NASA Co-Op Week 11: Leaky Space Station

Space Walk My latest opportunity to sit console was during a spacewalk (extravehicular activity/ EVA) by Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren. They were on a mission to upkeep the International Space Station's ailing structures. One of the primary tasks was to fix an ammonia leak originally identified in 2012. Media dressed this leak up with red flags and flashing lights, however, NASA predicted this fault to occur given the age of ISS and the nature of its climate control system. Since the ISS is a closed loop system the interior produces a lot of heat from astronauts and their hardware, water is used to cool the space station, the energy is then transferred to ammonia, and lastly into giant radiators. This 6.5 hour long EVA consisted of mating power cables, tubes valves, and checking integrity of systems. During the EVA I took flight notes on the procedures Scott and Kjell were running. I was to report what step each of them were on to the PLUTO flight controller to my right.

Grace Hopper Action Items Something that was scary but rewarding was presenting to my branch at NASA about what I learned at GHC and even challenged them with three action items... 1)Make the work place welcoming (paid parent leave, mentoring and celebrating results over hours), 2) Educating the community about how cool STEM is. 3) Communicating Effectively. I encourage you all to present action items to your current employers, student group, or college professionals after attending conferences.

Astronaut Training Development I thought I had made a pretty good astronaut training video... until I put it in front of user testers. I learned I didn't even effectively communicate how to turn the device on right! Back to the drawing board for me. I had 17 users of various ages, disciplines, personalities and technology experience test the training to insure I was catering to everyone. After reviewing helpful feedback I edited the training video again so the messages were clearer.

WAYS TO GET INVOLVED NASA summer internship applications now open: https://intern.nasa.gov/ossi/web/public/main/ Learn to code: https://techprep.fb.com/get-started/ Accomplishments this week at NASA: https://youtu.be/NPLPmdFx2yw Houston Maker Faire Nov14 (3D Printing, Robots): http://www.houstonmakerfaire.com/ Astronaut Kjell plays the bagpipes: https://youtu.be/7DWzmq9e0Lw

Get Hooked on Programming Quick

Highly sought for and praised- the ability to program. Admit it, being comfortable with technology makes you an admirable candidate for your dream job and allows you to navigate the modern world more fluidly. Unfortunately the idea of becoming tech savvy was soiled by the thought of dry lingo and geeky stereotype. For the tech enthused or not, young or wise I have seven ways you can get started with programming in a few hours or much less. (In order of what I thought of first)

1) Codecademy

Best for: Middle School - Adulthood and beyond

Project Time: 30min - As long as you wish

Languages: Web development, Ruby, Python, PHP

Where: http://www.codecademy.com/learn

Friends from internships used codecademy to get exposed to a number of languages relatively quickly and from there decided what to dive into.

2) Code.org

Best for: Elementary - High School

Project Time: 30min - As long as you wish

Languages: Java Script, HTML, basic logic, Lego Robotics, and more

Where: http://code.org/

A really fun way to learn programming by playing games or making your own! President Obama was visited by some aspiring programmers and completed a Disney Frozen themed project.

3) Alice

Best for: Elementary - High School

Project Time: 30min - As long as you wish

Languages: Java

Where: http://www.alice.org/index.php?page=downloads/download_alice3.1

(Younger programmers may need help downloading and getting started)

Alice allows you to program in pseudo Java code and control characters. You can make movies or perform skits with your characters by moving blocks of code around and assigning values. This was my first exposure to programming in high school. As I continued with my computer studies in college found that what I learned from Alice to be extremely useful.

4) Java Seal

Best for: Middle School - Adulthood and beyond

Project Time: 30min - As long as you wish

Languages: Java

Where: https://www.youtube.com/user/JavaSeal

This is my shameless plug; I started this You Tube channel this past summer and recorded some videos about how to get started with Java programming, a basic 10 minute starter program, and a 30min more complex program. Although I haven't downloaded videos recently these are a good start and I expect to make more this summer.

5) Made With Code

Best for: Elementary - Middle School

Project Time: 5min - As long as you wish

Languages: Basic Logic

Where: https://www.madewithcode.com/projects

My Mom's kindergarten class loved to make a Yeti dance and lights shimmer using the Made With Code project. I visited her classroom and had students drag and drop blocks of code on a Smart Board. These projects teach about basic programming logic and assigning values to variables.

6) Khan Academy

Best for: Middle School - Adulthood and beyond

Project Time: 30min - As long as you wish

Languages: Game, Animation, Web Development

Where: https://www.khanacademy.org/computing/computer-programming

Khan Academy has great videos for every subject imaginable in school and now for programming. There are many projects where you can make video games, a website, or animation. There is even a gallery of what other programmers have made while following along with the video.

7) Major League Hacking

Best for: High School - College

Project Time: Few hours to 3 day event

Languages: Any language! Common ones include C++ and Java

Where: Select Colleges https://mlh.io/seasons/f2014/events

This isn't a website to visit but a Hackathon event to go to! Hackathons are events where students are challenged to create a solution to a problem such as an app that can send you texts to keep you on task, a light that can let you know when you need to wear warm clothes, or the next big social media hot spot. Hackathons can run for a few hours to three days. Most of the Hackathons don't require programming experience and are a great place to learn.

(These age groups are just suggestions, feel free to check out any of them you like. I didn't make any of the logos except my Java Seal one so kudos to you other logo makers.)

FIRST Robotics Kick Off is THIS SATURDAY Jan7 at 9amCT! 

3,400 teams made up of over 85,000 students will learn what game their robot will be playing. Within a six week build season students will have to fabricate, wire and program that robot. The game's name, "STEAMworks", has been revealed along with some vague hints. Here is a post with some of my theories and the link to watch the unveiling of the game live.

Neutral Buoyancy Lab

6.2mil gal pool (fill 9 Olympic swimming pools) where astronauts train for EVAs.