We’re so proud to be welcoming Dr Michelle Thaller to Ōtepoti Dunedin to share her vast knowledge of space and the universe. Dr Michelle Thaller recently retired from NASA after 27 years, ending as the Assistant Director of Science at NASA’s largest base, Goddard Space Flight Center in Washington, DC. She has loved the stars since she could barely walk (according to her mother) but as a student, she felt pretty scared and lost in her science classes, until she discovered the curiosity, passion, kindness, and humour in her astronomy professors. She wanted to be around people like that.
While working at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, she became interested in how science was communicated to the public and decided to specialise in this for the rest of her career. Dr Thaller now has decades of experience sharing her own knowledge and that of others through science programmes such as The Universe on the History Channel, NatGeo’s The Known Universe, Nova’s The Secret Life of Scientists, several other BBC and PBS programmes, and the Big Think podcast.
Dr Thaller was recently awarded NASA's highest honour, the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal, for the contributions she has made to the agency. She has presented two TEDx talks and been a featured speaker at San Diego’s ComicCon, Hasbro Toy Company’s innovation workshops, and climate summits in the US and Europe. Under her leadership NASA has received awards for online science content and Dr Thaller is especially proud of NASA's social media programme. She is currently a professor at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee and a part-time commercial fisherman working out of Petersburg, Alaska.
You can catch Dr Thaller at one of these festival events:
New Discoveries, New Connections
Saturday 28 June, 6pm
University of Otago Teacher's College Auditorium (145 Union St East)
Free, booking required
Ask Me Anything! (About Space...)
Sunday 29 June, 10:30am
University of Otago Teacher's College Auditorium (145 Union St East)
Free, booking required
Wonder Project Rocket Launch Off
Sunday 29 June, 10am - 2pm (drop-in visit at noon)
Logan Park, University Oval
Free, booking required
Careers in Space: Women Shaping Aotearoa’s Future in STEM
Tuesday 1 July, 5:30pm
Ombrello's (10 Clarendon Street)
Free, booking required
Our thanks to the US Embassy for their support to bring Dr Michelle Thaller to Ōtepoti with an NZ Public Diplomacy Grant.
