News Post

When Hope Dickson ‘25 was in third grade, she helped to build and launch a “CubeSat,” a small satellite; she traveled to Cape Canaveral for its launch, and she became set on her career of choice: aerospace engineer. At Visitation, she has pursued this dream with a passion, becoming president of Cubs Who Code, participating in BEDA (Building, Engineering, Design & Architecture), and taking advanced math courses and AP Computer Science - and this summer, she participated in the NASA SEES program at UT Austin’s Center for Space Research. 

Out of over 2,000 applicants, only 100 were chosen for the two-week on-site internship program pursuing a theme of their choice. For Hope, it was the fundamentals of positioning for drone swarming. 

Most recently, the public has seen “drone swarms” in fireworks-like displays, but drone positioning, Hope explains, can ensure people remain safe while a team of drones enters a dangerous or inaccessible location. It has impacts in search and rescue missions, fires, medicine delivery, and more. It also offers an opportunity to explore other planets. In many of these situations, there is no GPS signal to help guide the drones, and they must rely on other positioning systems - light, sonar, local estimation. 

The project is an ongoing one with graduate students at UT Austin. “It was pretty intimidating … ideally the work we’ve done will help them with it,” Hope said. “It’s inspiring to be on the forefront of this new technology.”

Her group was tasked with building three drones with which to collect data, and the ten young engineering-hopefuls split into three small groups. Hope was thrilled when her group managed to build their drone, despite some manufacturing errors they fixed by hand, and get it flying by Thursday of the first week. Then, as it took off Friday morning, the drone caught fire. 

She persevered and pivoted to begin working with another small group who had yet to get their drone in the air, and started on the next step of their project - a mathematical filter through which to run their data and address inaccuracies. The math itself was graduate-level work, Hope explained. While she was disappointed her drone had become unusable, “I love math. I would have found my way to [this part of the project] regardless.”

When they finally got another drone up and running the next week, the mathematical filter on which Hope worked allowed the group to collect the data they needed to create their final presentation and deliverables at the end of the program.

“It was stressful going into the second week not having a drone off the ground. It was nerve-wracking seeing other groups already working on their presentations. Having the final product, seeing everything come into one visual - we did get it done,” said Hope.

The confidence that came from her three years at Visitation made a difference for Hope in a male-dominated space, she said. While she had attended a co-ed parochial school, she had not been in an academic-based co-ed environment since eighth grade: “The ability to be confident and say, ‘I belong here,’ was key,” said Hope, who noted that her initial first week at the internship showcased majority male speakers and scientists.

“Then finally, we had a female speaker. Our faces lit up. It was awesome to see a woman there who was a leader of the research center,” said Hope. “There have been strides [for women in STEM], but there’s definitely still a gap… it was a reminder that there’s still work to be done after seeing the group dynamics or attitudes in the classroom. We still have work to do to bring more women into engineering.”

She felt ready for the mathematical and scientific challenges of the project, and her presentation skills, honed in BEDA Club and Cubs Who Code, helped her to take their findings and make them accessible to both scientists and her family members watching their final product in an online symposium. Hope has been inspired to get more hands-on with Cubs Who Code this year after her NASA experience, to ensure other girls get a chance to see practical applications of math beyond graduation. “SEES was a great opportunity to see how math is used in a real career setting,” she said.

She put the Little Virtue of patience into practice with her group’s project. “We were all leaders in different subjects. It was really helpful to see how people of different skill sets work together; we led together to get different parts of the project complete and work as a team,” she said. 

Being a part of the NASA internship program, she said, “was full-circle for me.” She even met the professor who invented the CubeSat during her time in Austin. And her work’s not over yet - her team will present their research at a conference in December.

“I’ve always loved math and science,” said Hope. “There’s always one answer, but there are multiple approaches to get there. As far as aerospace, rockets and space are so cool. Things happening millions of miles away, they’re affecting our daily lives.”

That feeling was cemented by the second NASA-sponsored program Hope participated in this past summer (Virginia Aerospace Science and Technology Scholars), effectively, as Hope described it, “a Model UN for space nerds,” planning a mission to Mars. She worked on the strategic communications team that wrote messaging to justify the mission to the public, government officials, and international partners. 

“The technology we gain from space missions turn into spin offs affecting our daily lives,” she said. “Heart rate monitors, cordless vacuums. The summer has helped me see that. Traveling in space and learning about the universe is really exciting, and on a deeper level, the work that goes into planning these missions makes an impact on us in a practical way.”