Dr. Tess Caswell Shoots for the Moon

Recently, Upper School students enjoyed a conversation with engineer, planetary scientist, and simulation astronaut, Dr. Tess Caswell. Dr. Caswell is also a member of the Sacred Heart Greenwich STEAM advisory board, which supports the School’s partnership with IBM and NASA. This program implements NASA curriculum at all grade levels and provides career leadership and guidance for students interested in STEAM careers. 

In addition to sharing her path towards the stars, Dr. Caswell spoke with students about NASA’s Artemis Program. “I am part of the Artemis generation. You are part of the Artemis generation. But what is it?”

Artemis is a NASA mission to land the first woman and person of color on the moon. It is intended to be a long-term commitment to lunar exploration that will benefit science research and create a more inclusive core of astronauts. The next Artemis missions are heading to the moon’s south pole, near the famous Shackleton Craters. Portions of this surface have never glimpsed sunlight, and the ice within these craters may contain the ingredients necessary to support a future lunar base. These bases could position astronauts to take the next giant leap for mankind: sending humans to Mars. 

Currently, Dr. Caswell works for NASA as a spacewalk operations engineer, training astronauts to do spacewalks and script the actual spacewalks that happen at the International Space Station. Prior to this, Dr. Caswell worked in Launch Control, at the private aerospace company Blue Origin, and in Mission Control at the International Space Station. “I’m here to tell you how cool space is,” began Dr. Caswell. “I’ve had a passion for human space exploration since I was a child and begged my parents to send me to space camp.”

“Dr. Caswell’s presentation gave us a great example of the amazing capabilities and ingenuity of humans, only our imagination is the constraint of what we can achieve. This gives us hope that we can also solve the current problems on planet Earth!” writes Ana Nystedt, Upper School Computer Science teacher and Coordinator of the IBM Mentorship Program. 

Watch Dr. Caswell’s presentation here!