Photo: Wikimedia Commons | NASA on The Commons @ Flickr Commons
As a young teenager in Cali, Colombia, Diana Trujillo arrived in the United States with just $300 and not speaking any English. She worked housekeeping jobs to pay for her studies. In 2007, she joined NASA as an aerospace engineer, and her latest mission, Perseverance Mars, landed on the red planet on February 18. Trujillo credits her early experience as an immigrant in shaping her mindset: "I saw everything coming my way as an opportunity," she said. Working nights and weekends as a cleaner, she found herself thinking, "'I'm glad that I have a job and I can buy food and and have a house to sleep. And so, I think that all of those things make me, and even today, help me see life differently. I see it more as every instant I need to be present because every instance matters." Student Research Foundation notes that Latinos represent only 8% of the STEM workforce, of which women comprise just 2%. Trujillo believes the way to break the glass ceiling is to have more role models. "The more hers there are, the more engineers and scientists that are Latin are out there, the more chances we have for those kids to have la chispa, where they say, 'I want to be that'," she said.
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