Rocket Scientists

Women have made many contributions to the exploration of space. Both the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and NASA share profiles of women who have worked for those organizations as scientists and administrators.

Profiles of Women at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory starts by pointing out:

Say "rocket scientist" and you probably think of a man in a white lab coat. Say "JPL" to some people, and the image of the man in the white lab coat remains. Actually, JPL isn't populated entirely by men, nor is it thick with rocket scientists. We're a population of women and men of all colors, ages, backgrounds and professions. We are all part of JPL's mission to explore and to discover.

The site is plain vanilla, but that doesn't make the profiles any less interesting.

Women of NASA includes profiles of of women who work in many different fields - computer scientists, engineers, biologists, geologists, physicists, and, of course astronauts. The site is sleek, with lots of information for teachers, students, and the general public interested in science.

Photo: Aprille Joy Ericsson, Ph.D., aerospace engineer at Goddard Space Flight Center.

Annoyingly, NASA felt the need to "girlify" the site with a predominantly pink theme (looking at sites aimed towards women and girls makes me oh-so-very-tired of the color pink). I guess I should be thankful they decided against sparkles and flowers.

Tags: women in science, NASA, JPL