[MUSIC]
Hi, everybody, and welcome!
This is Teacher Bia.
I'm one of the teachers at 
the Lawrence Hall of Science,
and I'm going to be telling today's story.
This week on Storytime, we 
are focusing on telling the stories
of some amazing Black scientists that so 
often in our history are erased or forgotten,
in light of some current events 
that our nation and the world
are now having conversations about.
So, we wanted to take this time to 
really celebrate Black voices in STEAM.
And today, I'm going to be telling the 
story of one of my biggest inspirations
and an amazing scientist.
That is Mae Jemison.
In the description below, you'll also be able 
to find a list of resources that we compiled,
with a few books about Black 
scientists and innovators and engineers,
as well as children's books that 
discuss race and how to be anti-racist.
We also compiled a list of 
Black-owned bookstores in our area
as well as some articles and other resources
for parents and caregivers and educators
to have conversations about this topic.
But let's get started with today's story, shall we?
All right! So, this is our story for the day.
Our story is about the incredible Mae Jemison.
Right here on our front page, you 
can already see a picture of Mae,
and you may notice that her feet 
are not really touching the ground.
Hmm, that makes me wonder:
Where could she be, somewhere 
her feet cannot touch the ground?
Are there any places on 
Earth where that is possible?
Well, let's keep reading our 
story, and we might find out.
So, Mae grew up in the 
South Side of Chicago
with her parents and two older siblings.
And from a very young age, 
since she was a kid,
she knew she wanted to 
study science and go into space.
She was really interested 
about science and very curious.
She would look at the stars and know
that someday, she wanted 
to be a little closer to them.
And she was particularly inspired by Nichelle
Nichols' character in the TV show "Star Trek."
She played a character called Lieutenant Uhura,
and that's who you see in this picture over here.
And this is actually very important.
At the time Mae was growing up,
there wasn't anyone that looked 
like her that had gone to space before.
No woman had gone into space, and no 
Black person had gone into space either
by the time Mae was growing up.
And this was a great example of 
something called "representation."
Representation is when we see 
ourselves represented on the screen.
And by seeing someone that looked like her,
another Black woman being 
the lieutenant in a spaceship,
Mae got inspired and knew that she 
herself could also accomplish the same.
So, Mae Jemison was really impressive,
and she's also proved that nobody is limited 
on doing only one thing throughout their lives.
So, one person can accomplish many, many things.
Mae went to college at only 16 years old.
She went to Stanford University, 
and she graduated with two degrees:
one in chemical engineering,
because she wanted to do something 
called biomedical engineering at the time,
and she also majored in African 
and African American studies.
She was also a choreographer for a show.
She was a dancer and she 
choreographed a show in college,
and she was also part of the 
Black Student Union in her college.
She was a very talented
dancer,
and after college, she had to decide 
if she wanted to go into medical school
or become a professional dancer.
Both options: super valid for Mae.
And then, she ends up 
deciding to go to medical school.
She tells in an interview that she 
had a conversation with her mom.
One of the things her mom says was,
"You can always dance if you're a doctor,
but you can't really doctor if you're a dancer."
So, she ends up going to medical school,
and during her training, she 
went to a lot of different places.
She did some research in Cuba,
and she also worked at a Cambodian 
refugee camp helping folks in Thailand.
After she graduated from medical 
school, she also worked as a doctor
with the Flying Doctors in West 
Africa, in Liberia and Sierra Leone,
but she still wanted to go into space.
She had that dream from when she was a kid,
so she decided to apply for 
NASA's astronaut training program,
and she was one of 15 folks that were 
selected from over 2,000 applicants.
and on September 12, 1992,
Mae Jemison flew into space on the 
STS-47 mission in the Space Shuttle Endeavor.
Mae was in space for 190 hours, 
30 minutes, and 23 seconds.
Here, you can see a picture of her in her spacesuit,
And when she went to space, 
she decided to take with her
items that represented folks that weren't 
often included in endeavors like this.
She took a poster of the dancer Judith Jamison performing the dance "Cry."
She took a bundu statue, representative 
of a women's society in West Africa.
She took a flag of the Alpha Kappa Alpha.
That is the oldest African American
women's sorority in the United States.
And she also took a picture of Bessie Coleman.
That is the first Black and Indigenous woman 
to have a pilot's license in the United States.
And she thought that it was very 
important to take these items with her
when she was leaving the Earth 
and going on this amazing adventure.
While she was in space, she contributed 
to a lot of different research projects
and did a lot of scientific experiments there.
so now if you think about the picture 
we saw in the beginning of our story,
when her feet weren't touching the ground,
now you know that the reason why her feet 
weren't touching the ground in that picture
is that that picture was taken in space!
Mae became an astronaut!
So after her mission with NASA, she resigned,
and then she came to appear in an episode 
of "Star Trek: The Next Generation."
If you remember, in the very beginning of our story,
we talked about how she was inspired by 
a "Star Trek" character, Lieutenant Uhura,
and later, she herself got to be 
a part of the "Star Trek" universe,
appearing in an episode of 
"Star Trek: The Next Generation."
And she also founded Dorothy 
Jemison Foundation for Excellence
that was named after her mother,
and her foundation works on supporting 
advancements in science and discovery
especially for those who are marginalized,
who are not often included in programs like this.
One of the —
One of the projects that her foundation 
supports is called 100 Year Starship project,
and it has the intention of advancing science in 
order for space exploration beyond our solar system
to be possible within the next 100 years.
And that is a very innovative and very exciting project
that I'm sure it's very fun to be a part of.
She also wrote a book,
and if you want to learn more about 
Mae Jemison hearing from her own words,
that's one of the options of 
something that you can read.
It's called "Find Where The Wind Goes," 
by Dr. Mae Jemison.
I will also include some links to interviews 
and talks with her on the description below,
so if you want to hear what 
Mae has to say from her own voice,
make sure to check the description 
below and look at some of the videos.
I want to end today's Storytime by leaving 
you with a quote by Dr. Mae Jemison.
She says,
"Don't let anyone rob you of your imagination, 
your creativity, or your curiosity.
It is your place in the world; it is your life.
Go on and do all you can with it,
and make it the life you want to live."
I think this quote is extremely powerful,
especially coming from Mae Jemison.
As a Black woman, 
she says that oftentimes,
she has heard from folks 
that her dreams were too big,
that her dreams 
were not possible for her.
She talks about having a certain 
arrogance and confidence
that were very important for her to 
be able to block off those comments.
Even though people would have made 
comments in order to put her down,
she knew that those things were not true.
And, best of all, she went on to prove 
everyone wrong by accomplishing her dreams.
All right, my friends.
Thank you so much for joining me on hearing 
the story and learning about Mae Jemison.
I'm very honored to be 
able to share her story with you.
Make sure to subscribe to our channel,
so you never miss another video 
or having more Storytimes like this,
celebrating other Black innovators and 
scientists and mathematicians coming up,
and make sure to check our 
resource list linked on the description.
Thank you so much for watching,
and I'll see you next time 
here at The Lawrence at Home.
Bye-bye!
