Kelly Smith...

Background

Hi – My name is Kelly Michael Smith, and I love my job as a NASA JSC Co-op. I went to a tiny high school in the middle of nowhere in northern Iowa, and yes, I did grow up on a farm, and no, we do not grow potatoes. Idaho grows potatoes, not Iowa. In school, I had tons of interests (foreign languages in particular), and math was actually my least favorite course. But when I fell in love with my physics class my senior year of high school, I decided that I wanted to major in aerospace engineering (despite my tumultuous prior relationship with mathematics – don’t worry – we get along great now). Since I lived in Iowa, I decided to go to Iowa State University.

How I Came to NASA

In the Fixed-based Shuttle Simulator

When I arrived at Iowa State, my first semester proved very difficult as I found out that I didn’t have an adequate high school preparation for the science courses in college. Consequently, for most of my first semester, I thought about switching out of aerospace engineering frequently. However, I stuck with it, kept my nose to the grindstone, and was able to bring my grades back up. Since I loved my coursework, I didn’t want to give up on it. As the adage goes, anything worth doing is hard.

As a freshman, I attended the career fair, trick-or-treating from the various companies, very aware of my odds of getting an internship (quite slim). A year later and a year wiser, I carried my resume to the career fair and talked the various companies now that I was more marketable. I wanted to work for NASA the most, but I didn’t think I stood a chance of making it. I talked to some companies with lukewarm reactions, but then I talked with my last company of the day, NASA. Later that night, I got a phone call for an interview, and I reacted as normal person would (screaming euphoria). I interviewed with Paige Kelley and Kara Kranzusch (ISU grad, former co-op) and was terrified by their stony expressions! I left the interview feeling completely emotionally exhausted and very disappointed in myself. A few weeks later, I got an email saying that I wasn’t rejected (yet), but that I was being considered for the following semester as a co-op. I waited on pins and needles for about 4 months until I finally got word of my rejection. Although I was disappointed, I knew that JSC still took juniors so I followed the advice of my academic advisor, and I emailed Anne Roemer (Co-op Program Manager) about once a month to remind her of my existence and how much I was looking forward to seeing the recruiters at the career fair that fall (if you are reading this and you are looking for a way to get your foot in the door, email the co-op office literally every week or so to keep your name in front of them – it really can work!).

By the time my junior year came started, the career fair came, and I got another interview, but this time, directly with Anne Roemer, herself! About 4 weeks later, I got a phone call on a Friday afternoon from Anne. My reaction after I hung up the phone can only be described a combination of a seizure and victory dance.

My First Tour

Working console during STS-122

For my first tour, I worked in DM46, the Landing Support Office (LSO) in the Ascent/Entry Flight Dynamics Branch in the Flight Design and Dynamics Division in the Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) from January to August of 2008. There were 3 Landing Support Officers, and they were great to work with. They gave me real projects that were actually important to the operation of their office. I mostly created software for the LSO’s, updating and creating new tools for them to streamline their operations.

My first software project was to learn Visual Basic and fix a NOTAM (NOtice To AirMen) Checker Excel macro written by Kara Kranzusch (my first interviewer) in one of her co-op tours.

After I created the software patch for that program, I started working on a runway and wind analyzer program. It read runway data for about one hundred runways around the world, then accepted the wind and sky data for each landing site, did the analysis to break the winds into its headwind/tailwind/crosswind components and analyzed the sky data, compare it to flight rules, and then display flight rule violations to the users. Then it generated a KML (Keyhole Markup Language-an XML-type language for Earth browsers like Google Earth and Google Maps) file for displaying the analysis and data in Google Earth to integrate it with my other Google Earth projects.

My next program was to create a Google Earth KML file generator that places placemarks and data for about 13,000 runways all around the world into Google Earth. It replaced an older database tool we used, and my program streamlined the entire process into a more visual, user-friendly format.

I also learned a little bit of Java to take a data stream out of the Mission Control Center (MCC) and plot the shuttle’s groundtrack (real-time) and other data in Google Earth for ourselves, the FAA, and the Department of Defense.

I got the opportunity to take my first Russian language course here, and it was a lot of fun! Hopefully I can continue to improve on my nascent Russian skills.

Something I appreciate here is that I’m treated like an equal, and I get to sit on console with the LSOs during the missions, and do some OJTing (On the Job Training) running ALPs (Approach and Landing Processor), a program on the MCC computers to analyze the winds and their effects on the HAC (Heading Alignment Cone), touchdown point, touchdown speed, etc. The LSOs have a console in the Trajectory (TRAJ) /Flight Dynamics Officer (FDO) Multi-Purpose Support Room (MPSR), the room directly adjacent to the White Front Control Room (the actual Shuttle control room). I’ve also gotten to observe the FDOs (Flight Dynamics Officers) and GPOs (Guidance and Procedures Officers) during sims, and they helped to give me a more comprehensive understanding of console operations.

Outside of Work

Houston is a big city, a lot bigger than my hometown of 900 people, and there are tons of things to do here. Something I love as a co-op is that my work doesn’t follow me home, and I get to do my own thing when I get home, instead of during homework until 2 AM every night like when I was a student. I’ve done lots of reading, working out, co-op softball, volleyball, some football, running, and I’m learning a lot about cooking and improving my culinary skills! Also, it’s hard to beat the winter and spring weather of Houston! If you’re ever looking for something to do with other co-ops, there’s never a night where there is nothing going on. There are intramurals, broomball nights, parties, days at the beach, and lots more to do! The co-ops are great group of great people, and I’ve had a great time down here. It’s going to be hard to go back to school (back to homework and the cold).

If you have any questions about NASA or the co-op program, feel free to email me at kelly.m.smith@nasa.gov (while I'm in Houston) or kmsmith@iastate.edu (anytime). I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.