An Essay On Sally Ride

Sally Ride

First American Woman in Space

Astronaut, hero, and inspiration are three words Sally Ride is described by. In her lifetime, she was a professor, professional tennis player, astronaut, author, company owner, and women’s rights advocate. It is no wonder she is remembered as a hero to everyone in space and on Earth. Sally Ride changed the world by making women equal to men everywhere. She encouraged young girls to make an impact and take important jobs in the areas of math and science. She left a legacy as America’s symbol of women’s equality.

The early life of Sally Ride was tormented by barriers, but she managed to become a strong woman who was ready to change the world (CD). To begin with, she was introduced to the barrier or “glass

Starting her accelerated education at Westlake High School. Ride met Elizabeth Mommaerts, one of her professors (encyclopedia.com). She became Sally’s mentor and taught her and her fellow students about physics and science. In fact, Ride later dedicated her first book to Elizabeth (encyclopedia.com). Continuing her education at Swarthmore College, she finally decided she wanted to pursue science and give up her talent for tennis (encyclopedia.com) (SPP). She later attended Stanford University, where she developed her love for Shakespeare (encyclopedia.com) (CX). Throughout her education, she got degrees in both science and physics, so she was highly qualified to become an astronaut (CD). She was so highly educated and loved the sciences so much that she later became a professor at the University of California in San Diego (nasa.gov). To begin her galactic journey, she saw an ad in the newspaper, immediately know it was for her, she filled out an application (nasa.gov). She filled out the form with 8,000 others with an acceptance of only 208, her being one of them (Stine 25). When Ride was accepted in 1978, her astronaut class consisted of only 35 people (scholastic.com). In her training class, there were only ten minority people and 25 white males (Stone 98). Ride was ⅙ women in this class, the first six women astronauts in

When she was first sent into orbit, she was the youngest person of the time, not to mention the first woman (encyclopedia.com) (CX). She was sent on two different space missions and was set to go on a third, but after one flight’s failure, NASA stopped all planned missions so they could figure out what went wrong (space.com) (CD). Also, Ride was the only one to serve for both commissions investigating the two rocket failures with astronauts (nasa.gov). Beginning at NASA, she made a robotic arm for her first space mission (nasa.gov) (SPP). She was sent on her first mission, the STS-7, with Robert Crippen as her pilot as he would be for her next mission, the STS-41G (encyclopedia.com). Their were five people on her first Challenger mission, which does not seem like an accomplishment now, however to begin, NASA could only have two astronauts per shuttle (scholastic.com). Ride continued her career at NASA by being a capsule communicator (CAPCOM) for astronauts in space (space.com). Ride understood the job as a result of her previous space travels. She was awarded for her hard work and impact in space with the NASA Space Flight Medal and being added to the Astronaut Hall of Fame (biography.com). Before her journey into space, she was a top ranking tennis player who many professionals envied (Stone 97). Some said she could have been in the very top of the sport. She was a professor to many students at UCSD where she taught in the sciences,