SEE WHERE THEY STARTED / THEN AND NOW
LEVERAGE YOUR EXPERIENCE JaciLynn Poteet (’21) grew up in a small, rural Arizona town. Her love for math and science, combined with inspiration from the professors at an Embry-Riddle summer camp, led her to study Aerospace Engineering at Embry-Riddle. The Covid-19 pandemic interrupted the latter half of her college career, which made it difficult to obtain internships. She had an internship lined up in 2020 that was unfortunately canceled. As graduation approached, Poteet was nervous about her lack of hands-on industry experience. “I felt really behind all my peers,” she said. At the time of graduation, most of her work experience was at local grocery stores. Nonetheless, she wasn’t afraid to apply for industry jobs. Poteet’s first industry job was as a Commercial Space Transportation Safety Inspector for the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST). She was pleasantly surprised that her customer service experience gave her an advantage over other applicants. Now, she is transitioning into a new position in the Flight Safety Analysis Division within AST, specifically working in the Flight Safety System (FSS) Branch. She’s excited to move into a more technical role where she will be ensuring regulatory compliance of the FSS implemented for launch. “As an inspector, I saw day-to-day operations, but I didn’t always spend time thinking about broader impacts of the industry,” Poteet said. “The industry is ever-changing and innovating and includes so much more than just launch.”
Focus on the experience that you do have and how you can make that work for you professionally, instead of focusing on the experience that you don’t have.”
JaciLynn Poteet ’21 Aerospace Engineering
17 | Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University
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