Ivanka Trump Promotes 'Hidden Figures' As Her Dad Tries To Slash NASA Education Funding

WASHINGTON ― Ivanka Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos held an event at the National Air and Space Museum Tuesday, promoting the administration’s support for young women in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics. They even appeared with astronaut Kay Hire and showed the movie “Hidden Figures,” a story about the achievements of African-American women at NASA.  Trump paid homage to the women featured in the movie for “paving the way for greater representation of women and African-Americans in these fields.”  “My father’s administration has expanded NASA’s space exploration mission and added Mars as a key objective,” she added. President Donald Trump’s 2018 budget, however severely undercuts this women-friendly image put forward by DeVos and his daughter Tuesday.  If Trump gets his way, his budget will eliminate the $115 million NASA Office of Education. The popular NASA initiative provides internships, enrichment programs, camps and scholarships for young scientists, and tries to get more underrepresented communities into STEM. Advocates say it’s a critical way for more women and minorities to enter these fields, and that axing it would be devastating. “It’s how I started my career in the space industry. It’s how so many people I know got started in the space industry,” Laura Seward Forczyk, a planetary scientist, told The Washington Po...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - Category: Science Source Type: news