Women at NASA are making history every day by contributing to groundbreaking missions
and projects in the areas of space science and aeronautics. They're also dedicated to
inspiring the next generation of explorers to break new boundaries. We're celebrating women's
history month by recognizing their stories and contributions to exploration and beyond.
Hello my name is Alana Roche' and I'm honored to introduce you to Laurie Grindle. Hi Laurie.
Hi Alana. How are you today? I'm great how are you? Thank you so much for joining us. I'm glad to
be here thanks for having me. I wanted to see if you could tell us briefly about your work for NASA
and when you first knew you wanted to join the agency? Okay well um I've had quite
a few different positions while I've been working for NASA. So I started full-time in
1993. So I've been here for a little bit and over that time I transitioned from being an engineer
to even a chief engineer to a project manager and then am now the director for programs and
projects. So a lot of diversity of experiences but also a lot of diversity in responsibilities
but I've enjoyed it very much. I guess my position right now is more of a managerial one in terms of
managing the the directorate and all the project managers that work for me and for the center. But
uh when did i want to join NASA and when did i know that? I pretty much always wanted to work
for NASA. My father got his pilot's license the year that I was born and so I was always kind of
flying around or around airplanes uh from the very beginning. So I really liked airplanes
and then I was also really excited about the space program and thought that was really
exciting. So how could I not work for a place that embodies both of those interests in the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration so I was pretty pretty sure that NASA was where i was
headed from a very young age. Have you ever had to overcome any challenges to get where you are today?
So this is a topic that I um talk about a lot with my parents. So my parents were born in the 30s and
in the south and so for them lots and lots of challenges and then went on to become
professionals. So I have experienced no challenges like theirs uh by any means but the um you know
the usual challenges that people face when you want to do do things and be successful at them.
So that need to demonstrate that you're capable of doing a job and you know get your foot in the door
by making that that case to people by showing what you can do and then needing to continue
to reinforce that so you can keep the job. Those are the kinds of challenges that I've had.
But nothing that rises to what people traditionally mean when they say you know have you
experienced any challenges. Makes sense. Share with us any female role models who have inspired you.
Sure uh so those usual kind of pioneers right in aviation so like Amelia Earhart.
Bessie Coleman also uh Sally Ride uh because I like I said I also like the space program. So Sally
Ride actually went to the same high school that I went to uh so that um really made a difference.
A few years before me but that made a difference for me too because now
it's someone who has actually kind of walked in my shoes a little bit. And so having the ability to
see that that person then be able to go on to do great things. Maybe it's possible that i could do
you know similar things. When I got uh to what was then Dryden um Dryden Flight Research Center.
Marta Bohn- Meyer became uh one of those kind of inspirational sort of role models for me because
she was a pilot and an engineer and a project manager. So again another person that's sort
of nearby that I can look at and say hey I could do I could do things like that too. So um but the
biggest role model for me has always been my mom. So she is a United States district court judge
um and uh was appointed by President Carter. And so uh there's a person you know just right
next door who is breaking barriers every single day. And so for me that really told me what was
potentially possible for me different field obviously but just the fact that
if she could do those things and maybe there was a chance for me to be able to do something
exciting as well. A lot of the women you mentioned wear a lot of different hats in their job.
I know you do too. What's your favorite part of your job? For me it's all the projects I've
worked on. It's been the project team that's been the most exciting part of it because of the way
we come together and work together to solve a common problem so I really enjoy that aspect.
I kind of think of it as like the power of teamwork so for example on the X-43a project when
I started that project i was just an aerodynamics researcher. We had our first flight there
and it did not go well. It did nothing nothing happened as we would have expected it to uh and
uh it resulted in loss of the vehicle and a mishap investigation. But the whole team although that
was very discouraging the whole team was really passionate about wanting to know what happened
what caused this how can we recover from it. And so the whole team kind of rallied together to
figure out the answers and work closely with the mishap investigation board to find those answers.
And then um once we had that then we actually went through to work towards actually recovering from
it and returning to flight. And so you know we even our process was so diligent and thorough that we
even found problems that we had not experienced in that first flight but would have bit us
if we had not repaired them. So we even were able to find things that were later on in the mission.
So the way the team all came together worked so hard get the answers and then solve the problems
and actually fix them in returns to flight were rewarded with that
by having a very very successful second flight that did everything we wanted it to do.
And what does women's history month mean to you? I think of it as an opportunity to really
uh celebrate the accomplishments of women and uh also to make sure people know who they are.
So what you know these are great women who have done things that have really advanced
uh the path forward for all women behind them. And so women's history month is really an
opportunity to celebrate those achievements and then also show future generations what's possible.
And what is your perspective on how the role of women in STEM has changed throughout your career?
In the past what we've seen is um you know a lack of that encouragement and so there weren't as many
people for sure there weren't as many women from from the perspective of women feeling like or
being told that there were traditional roles for them. And so uh what i have seen of course through
my career is more and more women all the time every year there's more than there were before
and i think that's really great. So I kind of see STEM fields as being potentially more inclusive
than some of the other fields out there for that reason and so when I look at
uh and hear stories like um about our female computers uh right or like in like the movie
Hidden Figures of the book Hidden Figures. I think well maybe that's some of how those
barriers could really be broken down. Because they had the skills they demonstrated those
skills that those skills were in demand. So yep you could produce these numbers and so we want you
and at a time when things weren't necessarily as inclusive across the board not only for
uh you know African Americans but also you know just women in general as well. So um I
was at work on Friday and I walked I was walking up down the first floor hallway
of 4800 and looking at all of our you know historical pictures that we have there and
I was really thinking about that about um you know the female computers that we had even here and
um and how how they paved the way for others to follow. So thank you and thank you so much
for your time today Laurie. I know this is going to inspire other women. March is Women's History Month
and we're going to be celebrating all month long. If you could just give us a follow on all of our
NASA Armstrong social media accounts it is @NASAArmstrong and you can follow along
with us all month long. Thank you and thank you for your time Laurie. Yes thank you. You're welcome