Colin Claytor, DA Class of 2016: Systems Engineer II for Northrop Grumman

Colin Claytor began his academic journey at DA when he was in the eighth grade. He says that experience set the stage for him to graduate high school successfully and pursue his college and career goals. Colin is a systems engineer for Northrop Grumman working on a commercial space station project. Currently, he lives in Centennial, Colo., but will be relocating to Dulles, Va., in 2023.

 

DA first and foremost gave me the learning environment to grow and prosper academically. I do believe that had I not started attending DA for my eighth-grade year, I would have burned out considerably. I am unsure what I would have been looking at in terms of college prospects at that point. Secondly, DA taught me how to learn and how to have a zest for learning again. So much of my college and post-college life has been seeking out opportunities to learn for the sake of learning. DA really showed me how to be a lifelong learner! I credit teachers at DA, whose enthusiasm was contagious, for my excitement for learning. I have to mention that the first time I contemplated a career in aerospace engineering was in eighth grade due to an experiential class taught by Mr. Senne about space exploration. We learned about the history of the space race, played Kerbal Space Program, and thought about the future of the industry. The enthusiasm that was fostered in me has stuck around and grown!

 

In May of 2022, I graduated from CU Boulder with my master’s degree in aerospace engineering sciences with an emphasis in bioastronautics, which is a sub-field devoted to developing systems to facilitate human exploration of space. I spent the summer on the job hunt and recently started working for Northrop Grumman, supporting their project to build a commercial space station. 

Mr. Senne was definitely a great teacher. I fondly remember Mr. Miller for giving me a zest for history that I still carry to this day. Mr. McMillan and Mrs. Eskesen instilled a love of literature in me, and Mr. Price pushed me to achieve in the sciences (and gave me a love for XKCD). Señor Klock encouraged me to seek out experiences I hadn’t previously considered and taught me to be okay with failing and trying again (and for teaching me Spanish, I suppose).

The adaptability of the school was always something I appreciated. Whenever I felt like going off the beaten path to learn, DA encouraged that but also was there to give me structured deliverables when I needed them. It was nice to feel like I was being encouraged to learn in the way that best fit me. The experientials were great as well, since it’s nice to learn outside of the classroom every once in a while.

 

My career goal was to work on spaceships, namely space stations, and I am so grateful to have started working on one so early in my career. Beyond this, I would love to contribute to as many space programs as I can, learn new skills, and maybe operate a spacecraft from the ground. In the near term, I would love to work on a human lunar lander or habitats for the Artemis program to send humans back to the moon. After that, contributing to a Mars program would be awesome. I still have hopes that in the future I might be part of a push to develop cheap, reusable, super-heavy launch systems capable of getting considerable amounts of mass to orbit, and from there conducting some of the first large-scale, in-space construction and manufacturing jobs - space stations large enough to serve as cities and rocket engines the size of office buildings. It is an exciting time to be in the aerospace sector. I’m also working on my private pilot's license.

 

I chose my career because I love working in the cutting edge of human knowledge and exploration. Space is such an incredible frontier for which to design. To contribute to our ability as a species, to reach further into space to see what we might find, and to further the development of our civilization is an honor and a joy. I love my job and every day is a new learning opportunity. Getting to work with hardware that will allow humans to live off-world is a dream come true, and I get to wrap my mind around some of the most interesting engineering problems of our time (the pay doesn’t hurt either). It’s really just nice to be in a place I feel like I can contribute and make a difference in while also learning every day.