From Dairy Farm to NASA: Short Trip for Ag Engineer

When the space shuttle Discovery launched recently for a mission to the International Space Station, Slade Peters had what amounted to a ringside seat.

It may seem like he has come a long way - both metaphorically and geographically - from the northwest Pennsylvania farm where he grew up to NASA at Cape Canaveral, Fla., where he now works. But Peters doesn't see it that way.

Don't misunderstand. The Penn State alumnus concedes the airline flight or car trip is considerable, but in his mind, it's a lot farther in terms of distance than science.

The recent graduate in agricultural and biological engineering grew up near Meadville, Pa., where his family milks about 170 Jersey cows. He also worked at his uncle's nearby heat-treat shop, where they harden metal parts for equipment.

Now a fluid-systems test engineer with NASA who troubleshoots the shuttle's orbital-maneuvering system and the spacecraft's reaction-control system, Peters sees clearly that his earlier jobs and education prepared him well for his high-tech vocation. "Being involved with machinery started on the farm," he says. "Every summer I went home and did the maintenance on the equipment."

Peters started out in electrical engineering at Penn State Erie. Two weeks into his junior year at University Park he made the switch to ag and bio engineering. "Then everything just fell into place," Peters says. "I liked it a lot better and felt that I fit in much better with the people and the atmosphere. The classes were smaller, and I got to know all the professors by name."

Peters was pleased about how well prepared he was to land a good job. "As far as engineering positions go, as long as you get the basic principles from the engineering major, you can apply it to any job," he says. "I found out when I got to NASA that they needed me to have the basics and they would train me on the specifics.

"Ag and bio engineering is not just geared toward agriculture," Peters notes. "Other graduates are working on Apache helicopters, as food engineers at Hershey and as soil and water experts in the private and governmental sectors. It's such a broad major, and you can apply it to the real world in many different ways."