“Individuals see me now, they usually simply assume, ‘oh, she had it straightforward,'” she says, however Rose Ferreira has had it something however straightforward. The trajectory of her life has been so turbulent, in actual fact, that NASA, her earlier employer, revealed a function article about her dedication on its web site. That story chronicles her journey from a poverty-stricken childhood within the Caribbean and years residing unhoused, to pursuing her training and rising to change into a NASA intern, which finally led to working on the area company full-time.
In January, that article vanished from NASA’s web site. As an onslaught of govt orders and directives signed by President Donald Trump despatched federal businesses right into a frenzy of program cancellations and mass layoffs, NASA’s appearing administrator Janet Petro started aligning the company with the White Home’s new legal guidelines of the land. That included eliminating any workplace or program related to variety, fairness, inclusion and accessibility (DEIA) initiatives.
Word: This text mentions accounts of abuse and sexual assault.
NASA promptly started firing workers affiliated with such efforts and applied a freeze on all pending hires. The company additionally began systematically purging its web sites of any situations highlighting variety and inclusion. Inside three days of Trump’s inauguration, NASA’s web site for the Workplace of Range and Equal Alternative (ODEO), its related pages and any company web page with mentions of DEIA, girls in management, indigenous peoples, or environmental justice began being faraway from the web. NASA eliminated language on its Artemis program pages that referenced the company’s dedication “to land the primary girl, and first particular person of shade” on the moon as part of its Artemis 3 mission — language NASA adopted underneath Trump’s first administration, and a objective the company had promoted again and again. The erasure additionally included a 2021 graphic novel a few Hispanic girl and her numerous astronaut crew’s launch to the lunar floor. On Feb. 6, Ferreira realized NASA’s piece about her had been eliminated with the remaining.
“It is one thing that I anticipated was coming,” Rose Ferreira, 39, informed Area.com. Nonetheless, she mentioned, “it did really feel like a slap within the face … it seems like the whole lot that I labored for has been taken down little by little.”
Taken down
Ferreira was within the hospital recovering from pneumonia when she came upon NASA’s function about her had been eliminated. (It’s again now, however we’ll get to that.)
A faculty instructor contacted her to ask in regards to the lacking web page, which many academics have used as a part of their classroom STEM (science, know-how, engineering and math) shows. “As quickly as I came upon, I simply cried. I wasn’t anticipating that, to be trustworthy,” Ferreira mentioned. “I used to be actually weak from being sick … it simply felt just like the punching simply stored coming.”
For the reason that starting of the second Trump administration, many in Ferreira’s circle at NASA have feared shedding their analysis funding, and even their jobs, because of modifications directed by the White Home. “Persons are feeling a bit of extra protecting now,” Ferreira mentioned, “like they’ve to observe what they are saying, and round who.” The elimination of the NASA article and comparable pages despatched a transparent message to Ferreira and others:
“We’re not welcome,” she mentioned.
“My dream was by no means to work at NASA. I simply love area, and I needed to be in science, so I did something I might to try this. However as soon as I grew to become an intern at NASA, I noticed how a lot I adore it. I’ve an emotional attachment to NASA.” Ferreira’s first NASA internship was in 2022, on the Goddard Spaceflight Heart in Greenbelt, Maryland, the place she started assembly individuals as captivated with area and science as she was.
“In case you have individuals like that — people who find themselves proficient, individuals who work so onerous to be part of it, who need to are available in and work for the way forward for NASA — and also you’re mainly sending out the message, ‘that is how straightforward it’s for us to erase you. You are not likely welcome right here proper now.’ Then what are you doing precisely? You are simply protecting expertise out and also you’re dehumanizing individuals on the similar time.”
Ferreira described the brand new surroundings at NASA as tense. Individuals started to concern that contributions to their respective fields could also be disregarded on the idea they did not deserve their position if a DEIA program might have performed an element in them getting it.
“You do not simply journey and encounter these [kinds of opportunities],” she mentioned. “Individuals do not perceive that DEI was created so individuals like me do not get pushed out, or simply stored out.”
“A few of us work a lot more durable for a similar issues,” Ferreira mentioned. “I can’t even take a bathe with out being grateful for the water, as a result of I did not develop up with working water.”
NASA’s function on Ferreira solely scratches the floor of the hardships she confronted earlier than reaching her place on the company. “I perceive not everybody desires to listen to about hardships,” Ferreira mentioned, although she wonders whether or not the aim of highlighting tough tales will get misplaced after they’re diluted for the sake of palatability. She mentioned she as soon as turned down a e book deal as a result of the publishers additionally tried to shine her story by skipping a few of its most tough elements.
Ferreira works onerous on softening her accent within the U.S. as a result of as soon as somebody hears it, “individuals at all times deal with me like rubbish,” she mentioned. She emphasizes, nevertheless, that such vitriol comes from either side of her cultural divide. Within the U.S., she defined, individuals see a profitable girl with a profession in STEM, a number of NASA listings on her resume, and assume her path to success was straightforward. She says individuals from her nation see her in the same gentle, however by way of a distinct lens. They assume she’s had it straightforward as effectively. “You are each fallacious,” she mentioned.
Rose
Ferreira is from the Dominican Republic, the place over 1 / 4 of the inhabitants lives below the poverty line. She describes the neighborhood the place she grew up as, “in all probability one of many poorest within the nation.”
For her, training was “studying sufficient to depend the beans,” she mentioned. “It is advisable to learn to prepare dinner, it’s good to learn to clear, and it’s good to get a husband.”
“I refused to do any of that,” Ferreira mentioned.
As a baby, Ferreira mentioned she was known as a “malcriada,” a Spanish time period which means bratty, or badly behaved. “I simply did not pay attention,” she mentioned.
“I assumed the universe was simply the moon and the solar. That is it,” Ferreira defined. “I did not know the rest.” Her inquisitive nature would finally result in her realization that she wasn’t going to get the training she was in search of with out making a change. Within the surroundings the place Ferreira was rising up, it was clear: “I wasn’t going to get these solutions.”
Ferreira was curious in regards to the world round her, and was pissed off when she started working into the identical endpoint for any line of questioning. Her persistent probing in regards to the methods of the universe additionally led to her abuse. “The reply for the whole lot was, ‘God created it,’ and that was by no means sufficient for me,” she mentioned. “I caught a variety of beatings for that.”
The bodily abuse Ferreira endured as a baby did not finish when her line of questions would cease, nevertheless. “I have been by way of, I believe, just about each type of abuse that you can imagine,” she defined. Ferreira was sexually assaulted from a younger age till she managed to legally immigrate to the U.S. across the age of 16.
She moved to New York Metropolis, however the abuse adopted her throughout borders. Then she grew to become unhoused. “I used to be married off actually younger, and I left my husband. That is an enormous no-no in my tradition and the way in which I used to be raised,” she defined. “All people turned their again on me, and I ended up homeless.”
For the following three years, Ferreira lived underneath a bridge on 96th Road.
Throughout this time, she mentioned she had no training and barely spoke any English. Ferreira spent her days hopping on and off trains to go the time, however was determined to vary her scenario. In the future, she seen an commercial on a newspaper she was utilizing to cowl herself. A house well being aide firm was hiring care suppliers with no prior expertise and supplied 30 days of coaching. A month later, Ferreira had a contemporary pair of scrubs in hand and commenced working shifts to save lots of up for an residence. Ultimately, she was capable of earn her GED and start programs at a college.
Ferreira began at Hunter School, the place her educational advisor discouraged her from pursuing a level in science as a result of she did not have a math background. They “did not need to set me up for failure,” she mentioned. Round 20 years outdated, however ever the “malcriada,” Ferreira was to not be deterred. “I did not take heed to anyone. I simply enrolled within the lessons, and the lessons kicked my ass a bit of bit.” The punches would hold coming.
In 2016, whereas nonetheless working her in-home well being aide job, Ferreira was identified with cervical most cancers. Then, in 2017, she was hit by a automotive whereas strolling house from work, which landed her within the hospital. “My life up till 2017 was simply working and surviving so I might go to high school and get to do area stuff,” she mentioned.
Ferreira left Hunter and commenced taking distant programs at Arizona State College (ASU) whereas recovering, and would finally earn her Bachelor’s diploma in astronomy and planetary sciences. Her coursework at ASU led to her first fellowships at NASA, two subsequent internships on the area company, and, finally, her full-time employment. She has additionally since earned a Grasp’s diploma in area programs engineering from Johns Hopkins College, in Maryland.
Whereas in restoration, confronted with decreased mobility and restricted sources, a good friend steered Ferreira flip to social media for recommendation about her scenario. Her Twitter posts about her circumstances become lengthy threads of clarification, as descriptions of her struggles started to develop into conversations on-line. She rapidly gained a following, and located a group.
“I opened an account as a joke. I began speaking about my life a bit of bit. To me, these struggles had been regular. Getting chased by rapists on the road, sleeping underneath a bridge — that stuff was regular to me,” Ferreira mentioned. Her openness on-line led to talking engagements at varied occasions, which rapidly led to her involvement in outreach and activism for STEM training in disenfranchised communities.
She targeted on serving to colleges discover methods to make science extra attention-grabbing and accessible, and offering sources for youngsters coming from colleges with out science packages. Ferreira says she is motivated to do that work due to her non-traditional path to turning into a scientist: “I would like individuals to know, ‘oh, perhaps if she will be able to do it, I can do it.'”
When Ferreira was an intern at Goddard, she labored on the crew that helped launch the primary deep discipline picture from the James Webb Area Telescope, and had the possibility to report a Spanish voice-over for one in every of NASA’s This Week at NASA movies. She was mentored by Thomas Zurbuchen, former affiliate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, and had the chance to shadow him at NASA headquarters. It was 2022, the 12 months NASA would publish their function about Ferreira. That very same 12 months, she was additionally honored as a Brooke Owens Fellow for her STEM outreach. Ferreira was employed full-time on the area company as an analyst at first of 2024.
“That they had an enormous deal with opening alternatives for individuals, for ladies, who usually would not get the possibility,” Ferreira mentioned of the fellowship. “For me, that meant opening doorways into aerospace.”
Ferreira grew to become so profitable in her STEM activism that she was honored at the White House in 2024 as a Younger Hispanic Chief within the Area Trade. Just some months after receiving that honor, Trump was elected President.
Company
Ferreira mentioned some departments inside NASA started holding conferences inside weeks of Trump’s election to reassure workers and provides them peace of thoughts — but in addition to subtly stress the significance of highlighting their worth to the company.
“The temper began altering,” she recalled. “Even the language that was being utilized in a few of our inner emails.” NASA water-cooler discuss rapidly turned to hypothesis, rumors and tales of individuals shedding their jobs.
“By comparability,” Ferreira mentioned, “the web page factor sounds small — however to me, due to the background that I’ve and the place I got here from, and the issues that I needed to do to get to the place I’m, it felt like a extremely massive punch.” Nonetheless, she would not fairly blame NASA for the web site censorship.
“This isn’t actually about NASA. That is nearly what this represents,” she mentioned, mentioning that the individuals who scrubbed NASA’s webpages are doubtless simply doing their jobs. “That is not straightforward,” she added, “shedding your job or not having a way to maintain a roof over your head.”
There are additionally nonetheless individuals at NASA who Ferreira sees as household. A mentor and colleague who she mentioned seems like her “surrogate father” has labored at NASA for the higher a part of 4 a long time.
“After I was an intern for the primary time, I used to be staying at a extremely harmful place in D.C.,” she defined. “He heard that I used to be coping with stuff, and his spouse requested if it was okay for me to remain at their house,” Ferreira mentioned. “From then on, these individuals grew to become my precise household.”
Proper now, Ferreira is grateful for the knowledge household can convey.
“We’ve got a really unsure 4 years arising, and all people’s scared,” she mentioned. When Ferreira realized NASA eliminated her article from its web site, whereas within the hospital throughout her bout with pneumonia, she turned once more to social media. She posted on Threads in regards to the deletion of her web page, and it went viral. The publish has acquired over 85,000 likes and has been shared greater than 11,000 occasions.
Post by @rose_d_luna
View on Threads
The information unfold rapidly. Ferreira’s colleagues at NASA started reaching out. Individuals had been outraged, or apologetic, or they needed to understand how she was dealing with all of it. “It is simply been fixed,” she informed Area.com on the time.
Inside days, as a polarized web debated her scenario within the remark part of her Threads publish, Ferreira’s story on NASA’s web site was suddenly restored. Nobody from NASA contacted Ferreira in any official capability to tell her about what was occurring, both earlier than it was taken down or after it was put again on-line.
Pneumonia prevented her from returning to her job at NASA for an additional few weeks — and when she did, it wasn’t straightforward. The load of the tense ambiance compounded her nervousness about her viral publish: “I really feel like at any second I am simply gonna get the boot.”
The boot
Ferreira was declared pneumonia-free on Feb. 21, a Friday, and given her physician’s approval to return to work. She returned the next Monday. On Wednesday — 20 days after she first posted about her NASA web page being taken down — she was fired.
She mentioned she instantly knew what was taking place when she walked into her weekly one-on-one together with her supervisor; the assembly had an sudden attendee. An HR consultant rose from a seat within the nook as Ferreira entered the workplace. She was informed she was being let go as a result of she wasn’t fulfilling her place’s duties, “efficient instantly.”
“After I was about to open my mouth, she waved her hand at me, and was like, ‘No, we’re not doing that,'” Ferreira mentioned. “I am listening to ringing in my head.”
“They did not let me communicate in my very own assembly.”
Ferreira, wrapped in thick armor solid from a lifetime of perseverance, isn’t delivered to tears in entrance of others. This was not going to be the exception.
She was escorted again to her desk, to the shocked seems to be of her coworkers, the place she was informed to gather her issues earlier than being led out of the constructing. “I personally felt like a prison,” she mentioned. Ferreira stored her composure till she arrived again house, the place she lastly dropped her armor and broke down in tears.
“These are people who I trusted.”
Shifting on
NASA mentioned the area company “doesn’t touch upon personnel issues” once we reached out for a press release on Ferreira’s dismissal. Ferreira was inside her provisional worker interval at NASA — a bunch focused by the Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) spearheaded by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to downsize the federal workforce — however was not informed that was the explanation she was let go. And, in actual fact, the White Home knowledgeable NASA Feb. 19 that the company’s provisional workers could be exempt from the “impending layoff plan.”
Within the weeks since her firing, issues on the area company don’t appear to have markedly improved. Reviews of options made to NASA workers to purge their workspaces of LGBTQI+ symbols have emerged alongside claims of outright bullying over coworkers’ Pleasure decorations.
Ferreira heard these rumors, too. “I do not assume all services are like that,” she mentioned. “Each facility has its personal cultural identification.”
In the meantime, NASA continues progress towards shrinking its personnel and sources throughout one of many company’s most lively intervals since its area shuttle program was assembling the Worldwide Area Station. A 2026 price range proposal launched by the Trump administration on Could 2 requires a 24% discount to NASA’s price range. Ferreira would not see how the area company will proceed to outlive with these sorts of cuts. “If you see it from the within, you understand how little NASA truly will get, and the way a lot they do with it,” she mentioned.
Even NASA’s most up-to-date administrator, former Senator Invoice Nelson (D-Florida), is nervous in regards to the route the area company is headed. “The primary individual that was fired at NASA two months in the past was the Chief Scientist and Chief Local weather Officer,” Nelson mentioned throughout an event in Washington, D.C. in April. “I believe we must be involved about that.”
Petro, NASA’s Performing Administrator, has labored to steer the boat since Nelson’s departure, however admits occasions at NASA have been “bizarre” these days. She mentioned final month that she is extra keen than anybody to see the brand new NASA administrator be confirmed.
A vote to substantiate Trump’s decide for that position — billionaire entrepreneur and personal astronaut Jared Isaacman — was lately forwarded to the Senate by the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. If confirmed, Isaacman stands to inherit an area company going through the biggest lower to its funding in historical past, according to the nonprofit Planetary Society.
For Ferreira, she’s not trying to return to area anytime quickly.
“A part of me hopes that I can return in a number of years, as a result of my plan was simply to retire at NASA,” she mentioned. Within the meantime, Ferreira is refocusing her consideration on her activism and outreach to underserved communities. “I received so targeted, I finished doing outreach utterly once I went into NASA, and the one outreach I used to be doing was inside the company.
“I felt like I wanted to return to this to present me hope in humanity once more.”
