Latinas in STEM
Accelerating Success
By Gloria Romano-Barrera With a rapidly changing job market and increase in STEM-related skills,
Latinas are making great strides excelling and making their mark in the
industry. Latinas such as Aerospace Engineer at Northrop Grumman
Magaly G. Gonzalez and Cyber Security Senior Director at Intel, Xochitl Monteon
are empowering and inspiring Latinas to pursue their passion.
Magaly G. Gonzalez, MS
Principal Systems Engineer Lead
Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems
Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Aerospace Engineer Magaly Gonzalez along
with her sisters were encouraged by her parents to pursue higher
education. Excelling at math competitions in middle school and high
school, Gonzalez’ curiosity led to a bigger dream.
“These math competitions helped me be curious and that’s when I started
asking myself questions such as, “How can we fly to space? How can airplanes
fly even though they are so heavy?” Those questions are the ones that sparked my
curiosity not just for engineering but for space.”
Moving to the United States at 18-years-old, Gonzalez’ dream of becoming
a rocket scientist was closer to becoming a reality. However, her journey
was not easy as she did not know the language and had to adapt to a new
culture. “I remember being so excited to move to the U.S. and pursue aerospace
engineering,” she shares. “I now realize that to get where we want to be, we must
overcome the challenges that come our way because it allows us to build
character.”
Today, Gonzalez has more than 10
years of experience in the aerospace
industry with four of these years at
Northrop Grumman Innovation Systems
helping design launch vehicles (known as
Orbital ATK, Orbital Sciences Corporation)
as part of the aerodynamics group and
this year was promoted to Lead Principal
System Engineer for Business Capture.
Before joining Northrop Grumman
Innovation System, she worked in Silicon
Valley where she gained experience on
satellite design, supply chain, mission
analysis, mission operations, and electric
propulsion systems.
In her role, she supports business
capture and lead systems engineering.
This role encompasses understanding
Aerospace Engineer Magaly
Gonzalez.
customer requirements and flow down to each discipline for execution.
“Verification and validation of such requirements, risk management, project
management, and so much more so that we can design, manufacture, and test
hardware as to produce high quality
products for space and defense,” she
shares. In addition, she has been
implementing agile concepts with
her teams as to increase team
effectiveness and collaboration.
For Gonzalez, being one of few
minority women in aerospace who
has the opportunity to design launch
vehicles for space and defense is
a dream come true. “I get to help
design and analyze launch vehicles,”
she states. “I am a rocket scientist!
Also, my team is fantastic to work
with, right now I am in awe with
my director who is also a woman in
aerospace. She has been fantastic to
work with and an inspiration for me.”
Magaly Gonzalez preparing a wind tunnel activity for Latina girls in Arizona.
14 LATINAStyle www.latinastyle.com Vol. 25, No. 4, 2019
/www.latinastyle.com
