Casey Swails...
About me.
Hey there! My name is Casey Swails, and I am a senior from Georgia Tech majoring in Business Management. Yes, you read that right.I'm not an Engineer and I still work for NASA. Keep reading.there's still hope for you too. I enjoy running, swimming, shopping, softball with the co-ops, meeting new people and trying new things. I love to stay involved while I'm at school.organizations, intramurals, and especially my sorority, Alpha Delta Pi! I also love going to college football games. I was born and raised in the Atlanta area and Houston was my first experience moving out of state. If you are going to move out of state for the first time, there is no better reason to go then to go work at Johnson Space Center.
My fabulous work experiences.
The best thing about NASA is that you get to choose where you want to work each time you come back. You'll never be that poor intern that is stuck doing the filing and making copies. You'll get actual projects that NASA really needs to get done. Here's the best part.they let you pick where at NASA you want to work. Every time you come back for a work tour you can pick something new.
My first tour was spent in the Education Office. I absolutely love helping to educate people on NASA and share my experiences, so this was an awesome tour for me.
I was responsible for planning and implementing two events. The first one was the Engineering Career Expo. This is a huge career fair with about 1200 high school students interested in the engineering and science fields. We had about 50 booths for companies, universities, and engineers educating the students with their displays, brochures, and giveaways.
I did my first and second tours back to back. So after the spring, I went to Institutional Procurement for the summer. Now, if you don't know what Procurement is, don't feel bad because I didn't really until I started working there. In simple terms, you get to spend NASA's money by purchasing various things. Institutional Procurement was a great place to start because I primarily did small acquisitions where I was able to see the whole process. Most of the things I purchased were training classes for the astronauts and random other stuff for different organizations on site. In other areas of Procurement you'll have the opportunity to work on large contracts to order big things!
My final tour is this summer in the Human Resources Management office. This one has been fabulous as well. I get to hire people and work with employees and their managers on issues that may arise. I've also gotten to help rewrite the Astronaut Evaluation Board and develop a training program for all the Administrative Officers on site. Basically, I've pretty much lucked out on all my tours. I haven't had a bad experience yet, but neither have any of the other co-ops, so we've all lucked out by being here.
Outside of work.
SOCIAL! There is never a dull moment around here. The first couple of weeks I was here, I finally had to start picking and choosing what I was going to because there was so much. Since I've been here I've played broomball (you'll find out what it is), been on three softball teams, one volleyball team, taken a trip to South Padre, taken several trips to Austin, San Antonio, College Station, and etc. We have co-op lunch, go to movies, play laser tag, go to the beach, go to concerts, go to Astros games, go out for a night on the town, have themed parties, and much more. I don't think I can even name all the things we've done together. I absolutely love being at school, but don't worry, you won't even have time to miss it when you're here. It's awesome!
Questions???
If you have any questions about the program, Houston, or just want to chat, send me an email. Caseyswails@gatech.edu or casey.l.swails@nasa.gov. Thanks for reading!!!
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