By Jeffrey Kruse - Immaculata- La Salle HS
MIAMI | On the first day of his freshman year at Immaculata-LaSalle High School, Jason Quiroga was asked by his teacher what he wanted to be when he grew up. Without hesitation, Jason said he wanted to be an engineer and work for NASA.
The teacher was trying to show that setting clear goals is one of the best predictors of success. Evidently, Jason Quiroga already knew -- and his clear vision has paid off.
Photographer: COURTESY PHOTO
Jason Quiroga, left, with Eduardo Padron, with president of Miami-Dade College. Quiroga, an alumnus of Immaculata-LaSalle High School, was selected for a NASA aerospace engineering project. He was recently asked to tell his story as an inspiration for the college's incoming freshmen.
Quiroga, a 2014 graduate, has been selected to take part in the NASA Community College Aerospace Scholars project at the Marshall Space Flight Center this fall. The five-week program will include working on an exploratory team project directed by engineers, attending briefings by engineers and scientists, and touring NASA facilities.
NASA will be paying all of Quiroga’s travel and lodging expenses. “It is hard to contain my excitement!” he said.
Quiroga was always interested everything about engineering. As a senior at Immaculata-LaSalle, he was the captain of the robotics team, which finished second place in the league championship.
He was then selected from hundreds of applicants for a presentation on robot-building strategy at the 2015 Florida Collegiate Honors Council. The project “demonstrated how specific algebraic and geometric methods can improve and advance the precision and accuracy of a robot’s hardware and software,” Quiroga said.
But he always aimed at a loftier target: working as an engineer for NASA. During the summer after his freshman year at the Honors College at Miami Dade College, he took the NASA Community College Aerospace Scholars webinar series.
Out of several thousand applicants nationwide, approximately 300 scholars were chosen for the program. Only 60 completed the rigorous and technical material and were able to submit their projects. Quiroga created a proposal for a manned mission to Mars, and NASA clearly was impressed.
Quiroga says the education he received at Immaculata-LaSalle prepared him for the rigorous academic curriculum he will be facing as part of the NASA Community College Aerospace Scholars Project.
LaSalle is the only school in a network of more than 30,000 Catholic schools to earn accreditation for its STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) program.
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