Women in Tech: Engineer at NASA
Susan Martinez is a NASA engineer. She talked to us about her path to science and engineering, and her dreams come true.
“NASA has always been THE dream” remembers Susan when talking about her journey towards the internationally famous agency.
Susan Martinez is a NASA engineer from Alabama. With a feminine Instagram full of science, nails, empowerment, she talked to us about her journey towards science and her NASA dream.
“I was in love with space and NASA as a little kid, wanting to be an astronaut and all that” she smiles. A little bit older, she thought she had to let the dream go, as she was struggling with math. When she actually applied for an internship at NASA, it was on a whim more than anything else. She was certain she wouldn’t get it. It was at her utmost surprise that she got the internship in the summer of 2016: “ It changed my life”.
Her journey towards engineering
It was back in college, when she and her twin sister were going to take calculus, that they got encouraged to pursue engineering. “We were good at math and we found engineering fascinating” she looks back.
Engineering school as a whole was a huge struggle for her. Especially the last year.
“Probably the single most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do was Engineering school. Sometimes I look back on the long hours and the studying, I wonder how I ever even made it out! I have never worked harder, tried harder, gotten less sleep, and been so frustrated in my life” she remembers vividly.
“It was like when there was a problem, there was a deluge of problems, every time”
The senior design project was the icing on top of her entire schooling experience. They were building a robot for the NASA Robotic Mining Competition (RMC) and they just seem to face “opposition after problem after obstacle”.
“It was like when there was a problem, there was a deluge of problems, every time. Thankfully I had support from the team that I was leading and we got the robot built and went to compete in NASA RMC!” The robot from the competition is still in her mind one of her biggest achievements to date.
The NASA dream
As far as Nasa goes, Susan feels very lucky and blessed. “I got my internship because of my grades and then I stumbled upon the right people to impress and it worked!” she smiles broadly.
She got a NASA pathways co-op in 2017–2019. When she finished up college, NASA hired her upon graduation, in 2019.
Susan loves her job. She loves the challenge of it. “There isn’t a day that goes by in my lab where you aren’t challenging your knowledge of what the state of the art is, what the newest technology and methods are. I love the outside thinking that we have from our engineers. I appreciate their dedication to their jobs” she underlines.
Pre-covid, her days were field with lab work on additive machines, modeling and design work. Now, she hasn’t been on Base or touched any of the machines since March. “Life does look a bit different now. As well as everyone in our current situation, there are a lot of meetings, a little bit of design work, and a whole lot of collaboration” she grins.
Women in engineering
As far as gender equality and the question of whether it’s a male-dominated field, she can only answer for what she knows. “My lab is pretty small by most standards, less than 15, and when I started I was the only woman in the department”. But since then it got better, the number climbed to 4 women, herself included. “Engineering is male-dominated in general but when you are working in small groups where you are the only woman, indeed it feels heightened”.
But she’s encouraging towards women wanting to follow the science and the engineering path.
“Don’t apologize for being yourself, you are the only person who you can be. Not all girls in engineering are in competition with one another, just be wary and find the good ones. I wish I had learned these two things much earlier than I did. I think they would have really improved my life”.
