• Question: In your primary and secondary school what was your favourite subject and did it involve enything to do with your job?

    Asked by 759tch48 to Kirsty, Andrea, Charlie 🚀, Col Op, Vinita on 14 Jun 2016. This question was also asked by Kieran.
    • Photo: Kirsty Lindsay

      Kirsty Lindsay answered on 14 Jun 2016:


      That is an interesting question! At primary school I loved PE, but I was never very good at it as I am very uncoordinated. I guess it does fit with my job as a physiotherapist because I use exercise to help make people better, but i don’t play sport now.

      At secondary school I loved science, and I use science everyday. However I didn’t start off as a scientist straight after school, I did quite a few other things. It might be hard to see now, but as you grow up sometimes things you hated at school become the thing to love and are good at, and sometimes the things you loved at school you never use. For example I hated art at school, but now I enjoy drawing cartoons.

    • Photo: Charles Laing

      Charles Laing answered on 15 Jun 2016:


      Hi 759tch48,

      Yes at school I loved science and maths and these are the two most important subjects for what I do now!

      I think you should always do what you love and work hard and I feel so lucky to end up in a field where I enjoy working.

      Charlie 😀🚀

    • Photo: Andrea Boyd

      Andrea Boyd answered on 17 Jun 2016:


      In Primary school and high school Sport was my favourite! We did so many sports and had a big oval and tennis and basketball courts. It was nice to be able to try out different sports in class to see if you like them. Over the years I played for the school basketball and netball and softball and tennis and teeball teams afterschool and competed in all the interschool swimming competitions (we didn’t have a pool at school so I trained at the beach and in a local indoor pool) and I loved all the school sports days and competed usually in the throwing events and occasionally hurdles or relay race but am not a fan of running unless there’s a basketball to chase! It had nothing to do with my job but sport is an awesome part of life! I ended up choosing basketball as a prime sport and played for my university too.

      Actually in high school I also really liked Physics – thinking about big things and solving lots of problems and making sense of the world. Physics explains how everything works and it was the most important subject at school for my Engineering career.

      And… Italian. Which I speak often at work. There are lots of Italians at ESA. Sometimes in the control room there are all Italians and it’s super fun – we talk in serious, calm English on the voice loops to other control centres and space and then to each other we yell in loud Italian haha!

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