Bernard Harris is a spaceflight pioneer.
Harris was part of NASA’s 13th astronaut class, which the agency selected in 1990. He became an astronaut in 1991 and flew for the first time two years later, racking up 10 days off Earth on the space shuttle Columbia’s STS-55 mission.
He launched for the second and final time in February 1995, on the STS-63 mission of the shuttle Discovery. It was on this flight that Harris carved his name into the history books: On Feb. 9, he took a lengthy excursion outside Discovery, becoming the first African-American ever to perform a spacewalk.
Harris is a medical doctor, having served as a flight surgeon and clinical scientist at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston before becoming an astronaut. He also earned a master’s degree in biomedical sciences in 1996, the same year he retired from the astronaut corps.
The former spacewalker has devoted much of his life and career to helping get people, especially kids, excited about science, engineering, technology and math (STEM), and letting them know that proficiency in those fields can take them far — perhaps all the way to space. For example, he currently serves as leader of business development and fundraising at The National Math and Science Initiative, a Texas-based nonprofit that strives to improve STEM education for students across the U.S.
Space.com caught up with Harris earlier this month to discuss his astronaut days, NASA’s role in helping advance diversity and STEM engagement and how excited he is about the future of spaceflight and exploration.
