Lisa Spence is a flight lead at NASA in Houston who volunteered to be the guest speaker for the Bonnie Bourg Lecture Series that was held in Talbot Auditorium this past Tuesday.
The primary focus of the lecture was what goes on behind the scenes at NASA. Spence talked about the overall training process used at NASA and how much goes into what the team at NASA does.
Spence’s main responsibility at NASA is to manage the hardware for the neutral buoyancy lab.
She said the best part about her job is working with hundreds of people on a daily basis. Spence has said her job at NASA is tons of fun and she actually looks forward to waking up at five in the morning to go to work.
“Since I was very little I was interested in the space program but I did not see any direct opportunities with the space program so I got into engineering. Later, I wanted to be a technical instructor at NASA, saw the opportunity was available and just went for it,” Spence said.
Since she received her bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering, Spence has completed her master’s degrees in computer system design, public administration and molecular biology.
Spence also has many hobbies and interest, which include marathon running, reading, scuba diving, riding her motorcycle, flying her own airplane and designing and making her own clothes.
Her future plans include going to school this fall to get her master’s of physics, teaching math at a college level part time in six or seven years and learning how to play the piano by age 50.
Spence’s advice to all women is to stay in school. “You cannot go wrong with education,” she said “It is important to have a dream and to go for that dream.
“I have never listened to anyone who said I could not do something, and I have made it my goal to prove them wrong,” Spence said.
Although Spence is not part of the investigation team for the Columbia tragedy she said like everyone else, “I smile on the outside and cry on the inside for the seven lost souls.”
According to Cliff Fenton, campus photographer, the guest speaker for the Bonnie Bourg Lecture series this year was found by putting out information to the bureau of speakers for NASA. The coordinator for the bureau of speakers sent the information to all of the members to notify them of a speaking opportunity. Spence saw that the Bonnie Bourg lecture was looking for a female speaker and was interested in a particular topic of which she is very knowledgeable.
“I am always interested and excited to go to different places to talk to people and give them an insight into the space program. By speaking at the Bonnie Bourg Lecture series I am allowing other people to see the opportunities and possibilities of becoming involved with NASA,” Spence said.
“I attended the Bonnie Bourg lecture because I am interested in NASA. I want to work for NASA one day; I found out the testing phase and training of the crew are a lot more involved than I thought,” Quang Le, computer science senior from Thibodaux, said.
This lecture series was named after Bonnie Bourg, who was one of the five original instructors at Nicholls. In her 41 years at Nicholls Bourg held many positions and upon retirement was the vice president of academic affairs. Once Bourg retired, a committee of 21 members formed to honor Bourg through the Bonnie Bourg lecture.
Benny Zachry, professor of accounting, is now the third president of the Bonnie Bourg Lecture Series Committee and has held this position since 1994.
“The purpose of the Bonnie Bourg Lecture Series is to promote women’s issues on Nicholls campus and to honor Dr. Bourg, who promoted woman’s achievements. Basically the lecture series illustrates to students how successful various women of different walks of life have been in traditionally male dominated fields,” Zachry said.
Bourg has said that she is pleased with the progression of the lecture series and looks forward to attending every year.
“I thought that this year’s lecture was excellent. I learned a great deal of interesting things that goes on behind the scenes of NASA and was very interested in what Spence had to say about the Columbia space tragedy. The previous speakers have all been good but Spence did an excellent Power Point presentation and is a very admirable woman,” Bourg said.
In previous years Nicholls has had a variety of guest speakers at the Bonnie Bourg Lecture Series. All of the speakers have been women who have made great achievements in a male dominated career. Women in medicine, art, business and many other careers have spoken at the lecture series.
“This year’s Bonnie Bourg Lecture gave students an opportunity to see an area of NASA and space science to which they are not exposed. Hopefully, whatever their career interest is they will focus on their goals by laying out a path to achieve those goals,” Fenton said.