Kara Martin is a proud boilermaker graduate, and alumna of Shoemaker’s PC ‘07. She graduated with a degree in Animal Sciences and then completed a Masters from Purdue Calumet (Northwest) in Biological Sciences. Her parents encouraged her to join cooperatives during her early years of college, as many of her family members had been a part of various houses. However, it wasn’t until her sophomore year when a friend chose to rush, that she decided she also would, completing activation her junior year.

 

 Kara has worked with NASA for over 10 years, performing various positions and tasks along the way. Most of her work has applied to rodent research, where she has assisted in flying rodents to the International Space Station, training astronauts to work with the research equipment for the rodents, and managing the entirety of the rodent research project. She has also provided management support for other biological payloads, to investigate how space has an impact on how the body functions. For her dedication and excellence as a crew trainer for International Space Station Payloads, she was awarded the prestigious Silver Snoopy award. Fewer than 1% of the aerospace program workforce receive it annually, making it a special honor to receive this award. Kara was recently named and currently serves as  the Assistant Director of Science at NASA Ames Research Center. In this role, she provides management oversight and support for more than 600 employees, and many departments that span from biological science, earth science, planetary science, biophysics, and anything else science related.  

 

Throughout her life, Kara has always chosen to take a “leap of faith”, from making the decision to join cooperatives to taking new positions in her career, and even switching jobs completely. However, each opportunity has allowed her to grow, and learn to be successful. She states that, “I was exposed to a lot of different people, events, and activities and I think that has set me up for being very comfortable with being in new environments.” Kara elaborated how these experiences prepared her for working with various backgrounds of people, perspectives, and environments in the workforce. She says “I loved it in the end, being with the people, and today that’s all I do is work with people… all different kinds of people. Her advice for current students and shoes is to work hard, but don’t overwork yourself. She encourages individuals to go to various events and to slow down, there’s no rush to get to work.

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