Marissa Navarro

• Brooke Owens Fellow, Class of 2019

• Rutgers University, Electrical and Computer Engineering, ‘20

• Host Institution: HawkEye 360

• Mentor: Diana Trujillo

Marissa Navarro is a student at Rutgers University majoring in Electrical and Computer Engineering. She is originally from Torreon, Mexico where she lived most of her life. Growing up she was always interested in learning how electrical devices worked and was always troubleshooting anything electronic related. She loved watching space movies with her dad who always told her that one day she would work at NASA.

She started college in 2007 at Universidad Iberoamericana Torreon majoring in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering, but one year before graduation, in 2011, Marissa and her husband decided to move to New Jersey, in search for greater opportunities in their careers. It was until 2014 that Marissa was able to go back to school where she attended Bergen Community College and in 2017 received her Associates Degree in Engineering. She then transferred to Rutgers University where she is now pursuing a B.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering.

One day while watching on TV a launch to the ISS, Marissa realized that her dream was to become an astronaut. She knew she loved Electrical Engineering but she wanted to find a way to connect that with the aerospace industry. As an immigrant she knew that her chances of becoming an astronaut or working in an aerospace industry were slim but she knew she had to follow her passion.

She recently joined the Space Technology Association of Rutgers where she is working on a project to launch a CubeSat to space. She is part of the computing team that is developing a ground station to communicate with the satellite and will be working on the computer inside the satellite. She is so excited to know that a part of her will go to space.

As a Brooke Owens Fellow, Marissa interned with HawkEye 360 in Herndon, Virginia.