Don’t say there’s a lack of STEM talent in the South

Earlier this month, sports and culture news site The Undefeated published a story about NASA mathematician Clyde Foster. His calculations and computations helped launch rockets into orbit during the Space Race between Cold War rivals the United States and the Soviet Union during the ’50s, ’60s and early ’70s. For over three decades, Foster worked for NASA at the Marshall Space Flight center in Huntsville, Alabama. In that role, he actively recruited hundreds of black students into the space program. In addition, Foster helped found the computer science program at what is now Alabama A&M University. His quiet and relentless advocacy brought hundreds of African Americans into space industry jobs in the Deep South, helping to shift perceptions of black people in ways both subtle and profound, wrote Michael Fletcher in the story.