Meet Kaci Heins, the Executive Director of the Limitless Space Institute.

With a passion for education, Kaci works to inspire students and teachers to explore space sciences and imagine a future beyond our solar system.

Raised in rural Illinois, Kaci’s career transformed when she discovered space education.

Today, she creates educational programs that equip teachers with resources to inspire future explorers. Her work connects students globally to the vast possibilities in space, fostering a diverse and engaged future workforce.

In this episode, you’ll discover:

• How Kaci’s journey into space began with an educator’s reluctance and curiosity.

• The Limitless Space Institute’s mission and global education initiatives.

• The value of space education in inspiring future leaders and innovators.

• Kaci’s collaborations in Brazil and Nigeria to ignite student interest.

Quote:

“Space is just so cool, and it’s so neat to be a part of something bigger than yourself.”

- Kaci Heins

Episode Links:

Connect with Kaci Heins on LinkedIn

Limitless Space Institute Website

Credits:

Production by CxS Partners LTD

Executive Producer: Toby Goodman

Audio & Sound Design: Lee Turner

Artwork: Ryan Field

Find your place in the business of space: https://interastra.space

Space literally changed the trajectory of my life, and here I am now doing the same and knowing how important it is to inspire teachers with the limitless space institute. It's a huge component of our mission is to inspire and educate. And I believe that starts with the teachers in the classroom because exponentially, you're going to reach 100 and 100 and over time, thousands and thousands of students, and that's our future workforce. Space is the gateway. It's a lot of fun.

Hi. My name is Kaci Heins, and you are listening to 'Your Business in Space'.

I am the executive director of the Limitless Space Institute, which is a nonprofit based out of Houston, Texas, and it's our mission to inspire and educate the next generation to travel beyond our solar system and support the research and development of the enabling technologies.

But what does that really mean? That means that we help fund academia around the world, researchers that are doing amazing things in the realm of solar cells, light cells, nuclear to electric propulsion, and even warp drive. So spacecraft propulsion that seems like science fiction is actually becoming a reality. We help support that. But as a former educator, it's my job to take those amazing concepts and turn them into teacher professional development and lesson plans, so we can put these concepts in front of the future generation of explorers. So I grew up in a small town in Southern Illinois surrounded by coal mines and cornfields. So very rural, less than 9,000 people, and space was not something that was talked about at all. So I loved being outside. I loved all things biology, and I wanted to be everything.

I wanted to work for Lego. I wanted to work for National Geographic because I loved getting their magazines every month and seeing if there was a map, pulled it up in the middle of it. I wanted to be a zoologist, biologist, marine biologist. I just I loved just being outside and exploring on my own, which is you could do that back then. Get on your bike and just zip around the neighborhood and be back by dusk and not have any worries.

So I just really loved just being immersed in the world around me. I was very curious and inquisitive, and I think that's really helped me as I have gotten older to be where I am today. So I went to school, and because I wanted to be a part of everything, I thought being a teacher would be the best route for me because I could still dabble in all the areas of science and even history.

And, actually, I love the art. I went to school initially to be an art teacher, but realized I didn't really want to weave construction paper in elementary art for the rest of my life. So I changed to science and absolutely loved it, and that's where I ended up, starting as an elementary teacher and then getting my dream job. After that, teaching middle school science. That is my age range. I love middle school where most people can't stand middle school, but it's a great age where you could really inspire them and show them all different pathways to things they can be when they grow up, and and also be kinda silly and laid back where it's not too stressful, like high school when you're trying to prepare for college. So I found it to be the perfect age, that I and I loved to teach it. So when I was in my first science teaching job, I had to teach a unit on space science, and I dreaded it every year because I did not have experience with space science or space education.

We had a quick little bits here and there. I had an astronomy course in college, but it didn't really stick. And I really dreaded the space unit because the students had so many questions, and I knew so little. So they'd ask me, like, you know, what's a black hole? I'm like, I don't know. It's black. It's a hole. Stuff goes in. It doesn't come out.

I had no idea how to answer some of these or I'd have to say, get back I'll get back to you. And I'd put it on a sticky note and research it and come back to them later. And so I had a really great mentor teacher, and this is when I was in Flagstaff, Arizona, which is a major hub for space science. They have observatories, little observatories there where they discovered Pluto. They have, the USGS Astrogeological Building. So it's just Apollo astronauts trained there. So I was in this hub of space exploration and didn't even realize it until my mentor teacher said, hey. You need to apply to go to space camp for educators.

And I'm like, I don't know what this is. It sounds kinda cheesy. But I applied because I learned more about Flagstaff and our connection to space. And so I submitted it and I got in, and that's when Honeywell used to sponsor 200 teachers from across the globe. And I got picked and I was like, okay, great. I get a week's vacation this summer, and it's all paid for. And then I even show up the week of in Huntsville, Alabama, and the first thing they do when you check-in is they hand you a blue flight suit. And I'm like, oh my gosh.

When I got back, I changed everything in how I taught in the classroom. Everything was through the lens of space exploration because it encompasses everything. All my math, the real world application, every field of science, the physics, the chemistry, the biology, I could teach all of that through space, which was very exciting. There's lots of contests and competition so the kids could, engage with these, and they actually won some of them. So we got to take some students to Houston for an experience. And so but that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to generate experiences in the classroom because I never had that. And even when I did as an adult, I was like, this is absolutely amazing.

Space is just so cool and it's so neat to be a part of something bigger than yourself. So if I can show that to kids in middle school, that is when I can show them all these different career possibilities that I didn't know about and maybe it can influence them to get on a different trajectory. And, you know, we did. We flew on the 0 g plane twice with student experiments. We sent experiments to the space station.

So it really space literally changed the trajectory of my life, and here I am now doing the same and knowing how important it is to inspire teachers with the limitless space institute.

It's a huge component of our mission is to inspire and educate, and I believe that starts with the teachers in the classroom because exponentially, you're going to reach 100 and 100 and over time, 1,000 and thousands of students, and that's our future workforce.

Space is the gateway. It's a lot of fun.

When it comes to the business of space, I think the biggest misconception from my perspective, in the education realm is that you have to have an engineering degree or you have to want to be an astronaut to be a part of the space industry.

I think that showing students all these different jobs, because it takes everybody. You can be a doctor, a lawyer. You know, they need HR. They need accountants. They need people that can work with sewing machines, with the material science, to be able to sew the space suits and work with different materials and innovate new materials and ways of dealing with the harshest environment known to human beings.

It takes thinking outside the box to find solutions to those problems. So I think that showing students that there are all these other ways to be a part of the mission, all these other jobs, many don't even think of, even I don't know all of them. It's just it's crazy. But if they have a passion for something, anything, any type of job or skill, then there's probably a way for them to work in the space industry and be to be a part of something very unique and special to support the mission.

The best bit of advice I've been given is that to dare mighty things and the realm of space, there are limitless possibilities. There's so much to do, so much to explore.

But if you don't choose to dare something big, something great, you truly won't know what you can achieve. And it can be very scary and intimidating at times or you're gonna fail.

I mean, there are times where you will fail, but failure is an option. And that's when we learn the most, and I think that's a good classroom connection is we learn the most when we fail, because that's when we reflect. We, you know, change our strategy or approach, and usually, we're collaborating and communicating with other people.

And that's really important, especially these days is working with other people, being open to new ideas, and having conversations that help us overcome and find solutions for the benefit of the mission. So it's definitely been an adventure, and it's always an adventure. You always come across new things, but you have to be able to dare mighty things.

You have to be able to dare something great in order to achieve something great. Right now, we are focused on space education outreach. Like I mentioned, the limitless education program is a huge pillar of our organization and especially as a former educator. And what we built is a Limitless educator program where we have cohorts of teachers across the United States and around the world who apply to be a part of this program, so they're invested.

And we bring in guest speakers from the Space Industry Monthly, content monthly, and we bring them all to Houston once a year in the summertime when they're off of school to go behind the scenes of different space organizations, to meet astronauts, engineers, and to work together to generate new lessons tied to, standards in their classroom.

And what's been really exciting is that we can go global, as a nonprofit because the space industry is an international collaboration. If we're going to go back to the moon, Mars, and beyond, one country can't do it alone. We have to work together to share resources and people and skill sets.

It will take a village. And what's unique about that is that that's what we're doing internationally. We have a great partnership with a company called IHS Towers, which is a global telecommunications company that's mainly based out of Africa and South America.

And we've worked with them to sponsor 10 teachers in Nigeria and 10 in Brazil that are participating in a year long STEM education program through the lens of space exploration. And so we meet monthly. We brought them to Houston, but the really cool part is that we've been able to go to Brazil and Nigeria, in the last 2 months to do additional training with these teachers and conduct even more outreach.

In Brazil, we worked with the Brazilian Space Agency on a great collaboration to bring the teachers to Natal. And what's great about our program is that we empower teachers, not which is a one off thing.

It's giving them knowledge, education, and inspiration, and the tools they need to implement this in their classrooms, but then become ambassadors. So for teachers to go out and share with other teachers to teach, you know, this wider net, spread this wider net and teach them.

And we brought in teachers from all over Natal, so they were able to share all the hands on lessons they've learned in the program with the teachers locally, which was phenomenal. And then we just got back from Nigeria, last week where we were actually able to visit 2 schools in Nigeria. We worked with our partner, IHS Towers, to do visit community centers and also, of course, teach the teachers even more hands on activities to implement in their classroom.

So that was definitely a life changing experience and we just wanna continue doing more because students and teachers in these countries that are up and coming can see that their country is a part of the space mission as well. I know Nigeria announced, a few months ago, I believe, that they wanna send up their first Nigerian astronaut. And, you know, our teachers are essentially ahead of the game because they've been immersed in this year long program.

They're getting all this information and now they're conducting online workshops for teachers across Nigeria that they can sign up for for free to learn how to integrate these concepts, videos, hands on activities, all the things into their classrooms.

So I think we're starting with something really exciting that's gonna take off, not just in Nigeria, but also in Brazil as well because these teachers are very passionate, excited.

And I'm seeing the same thing that I experienced. You give them one experience and they're like, wow. This is really, really cool and exciting and it makes learning fun. And so they're taking it and spreading it, not only in their classrooms, but across both their countries. So now I just need to get in additional countries and, you know, light those fires and get people excited.

I am Kaci Hines, and you've been listening to 'Your Business in Space'.

All the ways to connect with me are in the links in the show notes.

To discover more, head to InterAstra.space

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