101 Black Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics: Leaders in Black History (2020)
Beyond a Black History book, this book will spark curiosity and motivate children, as well as adults to learn more about STEM related topics while making them proud of their heritage.
Black Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics honors incredible and inspiring black women who pushed past the bounds of human knowledge and broke down the thought barriers of their and our time.
We have selected 101 of the most extraordinary black women across all the sciences from the 1800s to today. We celebrate these black leaders from the past through today who paved the way for future generations of black women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
Spotlighting their stories is about more than just augmenting black history. It’s about understanding the cultural attitudes, historical forces, and social realities that made science what it is today—and what it will be tomorrow. If just one of these women had gotten fed up and quit, as others do, the history of science would have been poorer for it.
Children shouldn’t grow up thinking that STEM learning means boring textbook reading. Instead, this book will get them excited about science through fun and motivational stories. Our main goal is to introduce STEM-related concepts and present STEM-associated careers in an inspiring and entertaining way.
We have included within the stories STEM concepts and definitions in order to enrich understanding, but we have left other concepts for your child to discover on their own or to engage adults in conversation about. We hope this will improve discussion and quality time between parents and kids.
At the end of the book, we have included an exploration journal for children to describe their learning experience.
Aaaaaand THIS is how our princesses show up. Excited to share this black princess series which was a personal project orchestrated by Hair by LaChanda. The mission was to redefine and reimagine the traditional princess with our own dash of style, culture and swag. 🥰❤️ Thanks to all of the models and vendors who helped bring this project together. Photography: CreativeSoul Photography Hair/Creative Direction: Hair by LaChanda
Ever wanted to ask a NASA astronaut a question? Here’s your chance!
NASA astronaut Kate Rubins will be taking your questions in an Answer Time session on Thursday, October 17 from 12pm - 1pm ET here on NASA’s Tumblr! Find out what it’s like to live and work 254 miles above our planet’s surface. Make sure to ask your question now by visiting http://nasa.tumblr.com/ask!
Dr. Kate Rubins was selected in 2009 as one of nine members of the 20th NASA astronaut class. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Molecular Biology and a Ph.D. in Cancer Biology. During her first spaceflight from July - October 2016 as a member of the Expedition 49 and 50 crew, Dr. Rubins made history by becoming the first person to sequence DNA in space. She also worked on the Heart Cells Experiment which studied how heart muscle tissues contract, grow and change in microgravity. Before becoming a NASA astronaut, Dr. Rubins worked with some of the world’s most dangerous pathogens, heading 14 researchers studying viral diseases that primarily affect Central and West Africa.
Dr. Kate Rubins Fun Facts
Dr. Rubins and colleagues developed the first model of smallpox infection.
She conducted her undergraduate research on HIV-1 integration in the Infectious Diseases Laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies.
She conducted research on filoviruses (Ebola and Marburg), Arenaviruses (Lassa Fever) and collaborative projects with the U.S. Army to develop therapies for Ebola and Lassa viruses.
She has logged 115 days in space and 12 hours and 46 minutes of spacewalk time.
She enjoys running, cycling, swimming, flying, scuba diving and reading.
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August 26 is celebrated in the United States as Women’s Equality Day. On this day in 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment was signed into law and American women were granted the constitutional right to vote. The suffragists who fought hard for a woman’s right to vote opened up doors for trailblazers who have helped shape our story of spaceflight, research and discovery. On Women’s Equality Day, we celebrate women at NASA who have broken barriers, challenged stereotypes and paved the way for future generations. This list is by no means exhaustive.
These women were trailblazers at a time when most technical fields were dominated by white men. Janez Lawson (seen in this photo), was the first African American hired into a technical position at JPL. Having graduated from UCLA with a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering, she later went on to have a successful career as a chemical engineer.
Mathematician Katherine Johnson, whose life story was told in the book and film “Hidden Figures,” is 101 years old today! Coincidentally, Johnson’s birthday falls on August 26: which is appropriate, considering all the ways that she has stood for women’s equality at NASA and the country as a whole.
Johnson began her career in 1953 at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), the agency that preceded NASA, one of a number of African-American women hired to work as “human computers.” Johnson became known for her training in geometry, her leadership and her inquisitive nature; she was the only woman at the time to be pulled from the computing pool to work with engineers on other programs.
Morgan’s career at NASA spanned over 45 years, and she continued to break ceiling after ceiling for women involved with the space program. She excelled in many other roles, including deputy of Expendable Launch Vehicles, director of Payload Projects Management and director of Safety and Mission Assurance. She was one of the last two people who verified the space shuttle was ready to launch and the first woman at KSC to serve in an executive position, associate director of the center.
Oceola Hall worked in NASA’s Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity for over 25 years. She was NASA’s first agency-wide Federal Women’s program manager, from 1974 – 1978. Hall advanced opportunities for NASA women in science, engineering and administrative occupations. She was instrumental in initiating education programs for women, including the Simmons College Strategic Leadership for Women Program.
When those first six women joined the astronaut corps in 1978, they made up nearly 10 percent of the active astronaut corps. In the 40 years since that selection, NASA selected its first astronaut candidate class with equal numbers of women and men, and women now comprise 34 percent of the active astronauts at NASA.
“A couple of firsts here all make me smile,” Blackwell-Thompson said. “First launch director for the world’s most powerful rocket — that’s humbling. And I am honored to be the first female launch director at Kennedy Space Center. So many amazing women that have contributed to human space flight, and they blazed the trail for all of us.”
In this image, NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Christina Koch pose for a portrait inside the Kibo laboratory module on the International Space Station. Both Expedition 59 flight engineers are members of NASA’s 2013 class of astronauts.
As we move forward as a space agency, embarking on future missions to the Moon, Mars and beyond, we reflect on the women who blazed the trail and broke glass ceilings. Without their perseverance and determination, we would not be where we are today.
Follow Women@NASA for more stories like this one and make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.
Wow wtf HIV/AIDS was discovered by Flossie Wong-Staal, an Chinese-American woman, and she’s the reason the HIV test even exists. AND THEN she invented the molecular knife that lead to treatments for HIV/AIDS. And she’s STILL ALIVE. We don’t hear about the contributions of Women of Color enough, my word. Madness.
As the world celebrates the 50th anniversary of the historic Moon landing, we remember some of the women whose hard work and ingenuity made it possible. The women featured here represent just a small fraction of the enormous contributions made by women during the Apollo era.
Margaret Hamilton, Computer Programmer
Margaret Hamilton led the team that developed the building blocks of software engineering — a term that she coined herself. Her systems approach to the Apollo software development and insistence on rigorous testing was critical to the success of Apollo. In fact, the Apollo guidance software was so robust that no software bugs were found on any crewed Apollo missions, and it was adapted for use in Skylab, the Space Shuttle and the first digital fly-by-wire systems in aircraft.
In this photo, Hamilton stands next to a stack of Apollo Guidance Computer source code. As she noted, “There was no second chance. We all knew that.”
Katherine Johnson, Aerospace Technologist
As a very young girl, Katherine Johnson loved to count things. She counted everything, from the number of steps she took to get to the road to the number of forks and plates she washed when doing the dishes.
As an adult, Johnson became a “human computer” for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, which in 1958, became NASA. Her calculations were crucial to syncing Apollo’s Lunar Lander with the Moon-orbiting Command and Service Module. “I went to work every day for 33 years happy. Never did I get up and say I don’t want to go to work.“
Judy Sullivan, Biomedical Engineer
This fabulous flip belongs to biomedical engineer Judy Sullivan, who monitored the vital signs of the Apollo 11 astronauts throughout their spaceflight training via small sensors attached to their bodies. On July 16, 1969, she was the only woman in the suit lab as the team helped Neil Armstrong suit up for launch.
Sullivan appeared on the game show “To Tell the Truth,” in which a celebrity panel had to guess which of the female contestants was a biomedical engineer. Her choice to wear a short, ruffled skirt stumped everyone and won her a $500 prize. In this photo, Sullivan monitors a console during a training exercise for the first lunar landing mission.
Billie Robertson, Mathematician
Billie Robertson, pictured here in 1972 running a real-time go-no-go simulation for the Apollo 17 mission, originally intended to become a math teacher. Instead, she worked with the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, which later became rolled into NASA. She created the manual for running computer models that were used to simulate launches for the Apollo, Skylab and Apollo Soyuz Test Project programs.
Robertson regularly visited local schools over the course of her career, empowering young women to pursue careers in STEM and aerospace.
Mary Jackson, Aeronautical Engineer
In 1958, Mary Jackson became NASA’s first African-American female engineer. Her engineering specialty was the extremely complex field of boundary layer effects on aerospace vehicles at supersonic speeds.
In the 1970s, Jackson helped the students at Hampton’s King Street Community center build their own wind tunnel and use it to conduct experiments. “We have to do something like this to get them interested in science,” she said for the local newspaper. “Sometimes they are not aware of the number of black scientists, and don’t even know of the career opportunities until it is too late.”
Ethel Heinecke Bauer, Aerospace Engineer
After watching the launch of Sputnik in October 1957, Ethel Heinecke Bauer changed her major to mathematics. Over her 32 years at NASA, she worked at two different centers in mathematics, aerospace engineering, development and more.
Bauer planned the lunar trajectories for the Apollo program including the ‘free return’ trajectory which allowed for a safe return in the event of a systems failure — a trajectory used on Apollo 13, as well as the first three Apollo flights to the Moon. In the above photo, Bauer works on trajectories with the help of an orbital model.
Follow Women@NASA for more stories like this one, and make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.
I’m so proud of you. You’ve come a long way since that day I found you by the lake. Can you keep your emotions in check long enough to take me on? Or will they get the better of you as always? I always told you you’ll be ready the day you’ll knock me down as yourself. This is that moment. This is that moment, Vers!
In 1920 she earned her master’s degree in mathematics after 12 years of undergraduate and graduate studies at the University of Copenhagen and University of Cambridge, studies that were interrupted by 6 years of full-time actuarial work. In later years, she would study in Germany, France, Belgium, and Netherlands; in 1928 she earned a second master’s degree, in geodesy, from the University of Copenhagen.
Lehmann’s career in seismology began in 1925 when she aided N. E. Norlund as he established seismic networks first in Denmark, then in Greenland. By 1928, Lehmann was named the first chief of the seismology department of the newly established Royal Danish Geodetic Institute, a position she held for 25 years. She recorded, analyzed, and cataloged seismograms from Denmark and Greenland, published seismic bulletins, and worked as the “only Danish seismologist,” as she once described herself.
In 1936 she published the paper that sealed her place in the history of geophysics. Known simply as “P’ (P-prime),” the paper suggested a new discontinuity in the seismic structure of the Earth, now known as the Lehmann discontinuity, a region that divides the core into inner and outer parts. Using ray theory and travel time curves to interpret seismograms, Lehmann discovered that the P’ phase of seismic waves traveling through the inner Earth was not the result of diffraction, the commonly held interpretation at the time, but a clear indication of an inner core.
