21. Joan Higginbotham - Black American (African American) Engineer and NASA Astronaut
Black Inventors - The Complete List of Genius Black American (African American) Inventors, Scientists and Engineers with Their Revolutionary Inventions That Changed the World and Impacted the History - Part One
Countless important contributions to STEM have come from genius Black Americans. They range from revolutionary cancer research to the humble ice cream scoop.
Source: NASA/Wikimedia Commons
Joan Higginbotham is a Black American NASA Astronaut and engineer. She flew on the Space Shuttle Discovery mission STS-116.
She is the third Black American woman to ever go into space.
Biography (Life) of Joan Higginbotham - Black American Engineer and NASA Astronaut
She was born in Chicago, Illinois on the 3rd August 1964. She would attend Whitney Young Magnet High School before enrolling at South Illinois University Carbondale.
Joan is a member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority and The Links, Incorporated.
Education of Joan Higginbotham - Black American Engineer and NASA Astronaut
Joan graduated from University with a Bachelors of Science Degree in 1987 and a Master of Management Science in 1992. She also graduated with a Masters in Space Systems in 1996 from the Florida Institute of Technology.
The career of Joan Higginbotham - Black American Engineer and NASA Astronaut
Joan started working for NASA in 1987 whilst studying for her Bachelor's degree as a Payload Electrical Engineer. She would continue to be an integral part of the Space Shuttle team and would participate in 53 Space Shuttle launches whilst working at the Kennedy Space Center.
She was later selected for the astronaut program in 1996.
NASA, and Joan Higginbotham - Black American Engineer and NASA Astronaut
She graduated from the program would later log over 308 hours in space during her STS-116 mission. She would decide to leave NASA in 2007 to pursue work in the private sector.
Awards and Honors of Joan Higginbotham - Black American Engineer and NASA Astronaut
Joan was given various awards and honors during her lifetime. These included the NASA Exceptional Service Medal as well as an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from the University of New Orleans.