SANTA CLARA, Calif.—Mission College will host NASA astronaut Jose Hernandez to kick off its STEM Week on Monday, October 30. The Stockton native, who spent 13 days, 20 hours and 54 minutes in space will speak from 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the campus gym.

Click here for more information about STEM Week.

Hernandez and his family worked alongside farmworkers in the fields of the Central Valley and Hernandez did not speak English until he was 12 years old. He credits the federal TRIO program (of which Mission College has a chapter) for preparing him for College.

Hernandez graduated from the University of the Pacific and earned his Masters from UC Santa Barbara before embarking on a career at Lawrence Livermore Lab and from 2001 to 2011 with NASA.

Other STEM Week activities include making slime on Halloween, a panel discussion on the annual tropical ecology trip to Costa Rica for Spring Break (November 1), learning what it takes to work in a forensic lab (November 2) and a high school outreach day (November 3).

 For more information contact diego.espinoza@missioncollege.edu in the STEM Center.

For interview requests please contact Mission College’s director of public relations Niall Adler at Nadler@missioncollege.edu.