Her Story
About Aiyana
Aiyana Bage is a rising junior at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, one of the top STEM schools in the country. As founder of Adrastia, a nonprofit named after a moon of Jupiter and a Greek goddess representing minority voices, she focuses on advancing women's health and equity in the space sector. Her initiatives include collaborative medical research, bioengineering research, policy and advocacy, and science communication on space medicine to address gender disparities such as limited biological data from female astronauts and systemic barriers like inadequate spacesuit sizing. She also serves as chief research officer at a menstrual health nonprofit, scaling its research division over the past year. This work has led to invitations to the Princeton Female Founded conference and her organization of a conference at Harvard Medical School. Additionally, she has pursued art education for ten years and received awards in that area. Bage attributes her success to her motivating school environment, peers, early LinkedIn networking, and a proactive attitude toward opportunities through cold outreach. She plans to volunteer with a teen advocates program for sexual assault survivors and aspires to work in space medicine at large agencies while founding or joining a female-led aerospace company.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Aiyana
01What do you attribute your success to?
I would definitely attribute my success to the environment that I've grown up in. I attend Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology which is one of the top STEM schools in the country and I think surrounding myself with peers who are very motivated has motivated me as well. Going into places where I have people that I can motivate me that I can idolize. I created my LinkedIn account at a very young age and because of that I've seen a lot of people my age doing incredible things and that kind of motivates me and I think having the attitude that if you can imagine it it can happen. Cold outreach is pretty successful for younger individuals because people are more willing to teach them or help them out and just going for it has really helped me.
02What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Most often the advice is about expanding opportunity to ensure gender equality but I think what women can do is also create their own opportunities. Don't wait until you feel qualified to start. You can always kind of build what you want because the environment right now is very much I think there's a huge focus on startups and with technology it really enables us to be able to create things much more efficiently. Go for those opportunities create them and usually things will start lining up as you continue to persist.
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