UGA Star Student - Dancing, Traveling & NASA Intern

Rachel Paleg is an intern with NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and an all around go-getter: dancer, world traveler, gardener, community organizer. Working towards a Bachelor of Science at UGA, she's currently looking for an opportunity to work with people, utilize her science and GIS skills, and be continuously challenged. Let's get her infectious enthusiasm into Georgia's startup world (before she goes back to a wanderlust life of travel and education).

Class of:
2016

What is your major?
Bachelor of science in Geography, certificates in Geographical Information Science (GIS) and African Studies

What are you currently working on outside of class?
I am currently interning at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. I am working for the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) satellite mission, a network of nine satellites that provide data about global rain and snow. I work for the education and outreach department for the GPM mission, which focuses on increasing accessibility of the mission’s public data for students, scientists, educators, and the general public. I study earth science and GIS, and this positions allow me to connect my interest in satellite imagery with my love for STEM education.

While academics come first, I like to keep myself busy outside of classroom hours. I have been taking Swahili for two years at UGA, and am a member of UGASWAH, the Swahili club. I also dance and choreograph for Prelude, a student dance group. Athens is an incredible city, with many volunteer opportunities which I try to take advantage of as often as possible. I help out with UGA Lunchbox Gardens, which runs weekly after-school gardening and environmental clubs for local elementary schools. I love being outdoors and gardening, and next year will serve as Urban Agriculture intern for the Office of Sustainability, helping to run the rooftop garden of the Geography/Geology building. I look forward to a year of getting my hands dirty and making the space more accessible to the student body!

What past projects have you worked on?
Thanks to the generous help of the UGA Honors Program and UGA Office of International Education, I have been able to do a decent amount of traveling during my undergraduate career. After freshman year, I spent my summer volunteering in Chiang Mai, Thailand at an elephant sanctuary as a Freeman scholar. I spent my days taking care of the elephants, as well as interacting with visitors to the sanctuary and discussing local elephant conservation. I then taught English at a Buddhist monk temple for a few weeks, followed by some fun backpacking in the area.

I spent the fall semester of my sophomore year living and working on the Pearl Harbor Naval Base in Oahu, Hawaii in one of the child development center on base. This experience exposed me to early childhood curriculum development, which has been a critical component in my current internship, which focuses heavily on STEM education and outreach.

After my sophomore year, I traveled to Tanzania for the summer thanks to funding from the UGA Honors International Scholar Program and the Keds Brave Life Career grant. I interned at the KIWAKKUKI Hiv/Aids Center, which provides resources to those affected with Hiv/Aids in the Kilimanjaro region. I was able to develop my Swahili skills while teaching computer skills courses to local students, as well as assisting with the outreach efforts of the center.

During my junior year, I had to get back to my favorite country in the world, Thailand, and spent my spring semester in Phuket, the largest island in the southern island chain. I took classes at the Prince of Songkla University, where I was the only American among the 3,000 students enrolled. I also interned at the Shark Guardian, which is a UK non-profit that focuses on shark conservation, education, and research. My main focus was assisting in efforts to document the Thai shark species in a database through geotagging. I worked with local dive shops, and even was able to scuba dive with sharks. On each dive I would see as many as 15 sharks!

What are your best technical or creative skills?
One of my favorite things about my current internship is that I get to work with a dynamic group of scientists who come from a variety of backgrounds. I thrive in group environments, and find that collaborative projects are often most successful. I love meeting and working with all types of people, which allows for an intersection of ideas that stem from all types of experiences. I am good at working with people and engaging teams, which is very important in the science field.

What’s next on your list to learn?
My background in GIS and education paved the way to this position at NASA, but I have now found myself riveted by satellites and aerospace technology. I am looking forward to learning more about this field, and how GIS and education can be implemented. Next semester I will be taking satellite meteorology and climatology at UGA, which will expand my knowledge of other climate satellites besides GPM. GIS is an exciting field for multiple reasons, one of them being the vast and various types of applications it can be used for.

Any interest in startups?
A community of people looking to utilize technology to revolutionize the world? How could someone not be interested?

Post graduation plans?
I previously envisioned myself going into a technician position, focusing solely on GIS. After this internship, though, I have become quite excited about the outreach side of the science field. Any job where I am able to work with people, utilize my science and GIS skills, and be continually challenged sounds ideal to me. I would love to one day work for NASA or National Geographic, but love learning about all the possibilities out there. Post graduation I hope to complete a masters abroad, work for a bit, and then go back to school for a PhD!