Someone's URSA Experience 2022

This week I was lucky enough to meet and talk to Crya Sadowl of Airway Science for Kids, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing aviation education and experiences for underserved youth. They’re based in Portland, and through their hard work, they give kids wonderful experiences all for free. Cyra is a leading member of their team and is dedicated to making all of their experiences and education as accessible as possible for all students to enjoy. I asked Crya some questions about her job at the nonprofit, to see how they are catering to underserved and neurodivergent youth to better my understanding of where the industry can go forward and help my research on neurodivergent students.

I first asked her how she got into this industry since her background is in middle school education. She found a connection, and they started up the aerospace education program now known as Airway Science for Kids. She says that the field is extremely exclusive now, but the current line of professionals is largely made up of older men, so there is a need for a new age of employees. I asked Cyra about the favorite parts of her job, and the least favorite parts. She said that the joy of being able to bring these experiences to all types of children is her favorite, and that she can always see their grin that just says, “I did this” after their flight experiences. With the least favorite bits, she says that the field is not very inclusive and its always an uphill battle to get more diversity in the aerospace industry, saying, “They are comfortable with their control” and that many changes are needed such as inclusivity and accesibility.

Since my research is based on neurodivergency, I asked Cyra how they cater to neurodivergent students and make sure that their activities are accessible for everyone to enjoy. She said that they do different things for different situations, for example, with on site activities in their building, they use softer lighting and alternative lighting to soften the room. They also use white noise in the background, and they have ‘brain breaks’ where the kids can go to a separate room and do different calming and relaxing activities. When they are doing presentations in a classroom, they have copies of the information printed in the font verdana, which is proven to be easier to read for people with dyslexia. In the presentations themselves, the use graphics and each slide only has a single piece of information, to declutter the screen and make it easier to read and understand. She said that she tries to put in the idea of “learning your own way” in these different situations, and that many neurodivergent people have their own specific ways of doing that and the best way to help them is to let them do just that. In these simple ways, they are creating an accessible and innovative program that all students can enjoy.

Towards the end of our conversation I asked how she deals with the hardships of the field. Because of how exclusive it is, people are waiting for their failures and when they inevitably happen it is something that those individuals point to as example for why the field can’t change. She said, “there is liberation in owning your own failures”, and that as long as you keep your head up it will get better. I also asked her how she deals with that and what people should know about the field. She said that they do things now, and apologize later. She also wishes that people would know that there are resources for everything, and you just have to dig to find what you need.

This interview was very eye opening to me, as I had no idea that the field was so exclusively male and unadopting to change. However, it is people like Cyra and organizations like Airway Science for Kids that are changing the game. They are working tirelessly to change that exclusiveness and bring forth a new age of pilots and aerospace professionals. I highly encourage everyone to go check out their page and see how this Portland-based operation is changing this industry in the most positive way.

See you next week,

-Chloe