Divine Women of Our time: Mae Jemison

Mae Carol Jemison (born October 17, 1956) is an African American physician and NASA astronaut. She became the first woman of recent African ancestry to travel in space when she went into orbit aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour on September 12, 1992.

Jemison says she was inspired by Martin Luther King Jr. but to her King's dream wasn't an illusive fantasy but a call to action. "Too often people paint him like Santa -- smiley and inoffensive," says Jemison. "But when I think of Martin Luther King Jr. I think of attitude, audacity, and bravery. "The best way to make dreams come true is to wake up," says Jemison

Jemison graduated from Chicago's Morgan Park High School in 1973 and entered Stanford University at age 16. Jemison graduated from Stanford in 1977, receiving a B.S. in chemical engineering and fulfilling the requirements for a B.A. in African and Afro-American Studies. Jemison obtained her Doctor of Medicine degree in 1981 from Cornell Medical College (now Weill Medical College of Cornell University) She interned at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center and later worked as a general practitioner. During her years at Cornell Medical College, Jemison took lessons in modern dance at the Alvin Ailey school. Jemison later built a dance studio in her home and has choreographed and produced several shows of modern jazz and African dance.

Jemsion was turned down on her first application to NASA, but in 1987 Jemison was accepted on her second application and became one of the fifteen candidates accepted from over 2,000 applicants. Her work with NASA before her shuttle launch included launch support activities at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and verification of Shuttle computer software in the Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory (SAIL). Jemison flew her only space mission from September 12 to 20, 1992 as a Mission Specialist on STS-47.

Because of her love of dance and as a salute to creativity, Jemison took a poster from the Alvin Ailey American Dance Company along with her on the flight. "Many people do not see a connection between science and dance," says Jemison. "but I consider them both to be expressions of the boundless creativity that people have to share with one another. Jemison resigned from NASA in March 1993. "I left NASA because I'm very interested in how social sciences interact with technologies," says Jemison.

In 1994, Jemison founded the Dorothy Jemison Foundation for Excellence and named the foundation in honor of her mother. " One of the projects of Jemison's foundation is The Earth We Share (TEWS), an international science camp where students, ages 12 to 16, work to solve current global problems, like "How Many People Can the Earth Hold" and "Predict the Hot Public Stocks of The Year 2030.

In 1999, Jemison founded BioSentient Corp and has been working to develop a portable device that allows mobile monitoring of the involuntary nervous system. Biosentient has obtained the license to commercialize NASA's space-age technology known as Autogenic Feedback Training Exercise (AFTE), a patented technique that uses biofeedback and autogenic therapy to allow patients to monitor and control their physiology as a possible treatment for anxiety and stress related disorders.

Jemsion sometimes appears at charity events. Jemison is an active public speaker who appears before private and public groups promoting science and technology as well as providing an inspirational and educational message for young people. "Having been an astronaut gives me a platform," says Jemison,"but I'd blow it if I just talked about the Shuttle. "Jemison uses her platform to speak out on the gap in the quality of health-care between the United States and the Third World. "Martin Luther King ... didn't just have a dream, he got things done."[

Jemison is a Professor-at-Large at Cornell University and was a professor of Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College from 1995 to 2002. Jemison continues to advocate strongly in favor of science education and getting minority students interested in science. She sees science and technology as being very much a part of society, and African-Americans as having been deeply involved in U.S. science and technology from the beginning.

Jemison participated with First Lady Michelle Obama in a forum for promising girls in the Washington, D.C. public schools in March 2009. Source:Wikipedia.com
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Divine Women of Our Time is a series to remind us of the rich culture we come from and to celebrate black history month. I will profile strong women that have been apart of building a culture, paving ways for those after them and who have made a memorable impact within their industry. These women were not only leaders, but they were role models for many people at an appointed time. Most of these women are still with us thankfully. Rightfully so, I want to celebrate them while they are here and can understand that there relevance is appreciated as apart of our rich history.