Dorothy Vaughan's Life And Accomplishments

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Dorothy Vaughan, a mathematical engineer who paved the way for many to later follow at NASA as well as in the world we live in today. Dorothy Vaughan was an African-American mathematical engineer who was born on September 20, 1910 in Kansas City, Missouri. Although this being her hometown, she later moved to Morgantown, West Virginia where she would graduate from Beechurst high school in 1925. Four years following her graduation, Dorothy received a Bachelor of Science degree from Wilberforce University which was located in Ohio. Shortly after Dorothy Vaughan, who was Dorothy Johnson at the time, married Howard Vaughan in 1932. The next eleven years after her marriage, Dorothy split her time by teaching mathematics at Robert Russa Moton High …show more content…

These opportunities allowed Dorothy to become a well known advocate for women's rights in the work force. Dorothy often promoted ideas of women earning an equal pay as well as an increased salary, which at the time did not exist. Vaughan had finally found her spot in society, where she only thought she would end up for a limited time only, eventually led to decades. After being promoted Dorothy lead the West Area Computing for another decade before NACA finally started transitioning into the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or better known as NASA. During this transition, NASA made it a goal to completely abolish any form of segregation inside their workplace. They wanted everyone to be able to work together, for it wasn’t about them, it was about the astronauts who were being launched into space. After the complete transition from NACA to NASA, Vaughan worked in the Analysis and Computation Division department where she became an expert FORTRAN programmer. It was here where she worked on massive projects, one of the main known as SCOUT or Solid Controlled Orbital Utility Test. This launch vehicle program became one of the most successful as well as reliable launch