the company was not willing to give her a seat before she financially secured it, and fundraisers would not sponsor her unless she had already secured a seat.
This led Calandrelli, with the support of her husband, to make the decision to sign on for the Blue Origin space flight, betting her own life savings and then looking to secure the funds for it. Calandrelli reached out to every brand partner she had worked with in the past to seek funding, and one notable yes she received came from Brad and Alys Smith at Marshall University.
“ I love the fact that Brad and Alys Smith not only wanted to help Marshall but West Virginia as a whole,” she says.“ Because of them, I was able to leverage this space flight to shine a huge spotlight on the state.”
Throughout her space flight, Calandrelli promoted the tuition support program Marshall for All, Marshall Forever. She says with the current cost of college tuition being so high, the program helps Marshall students get the education they deserve without having to stress about funding.
“ I’ m a huge believer that when you remove the financial aspect of the equation you can focus solely on being the best student possible, and Marshall for All, Marshall Forever helps more students do that,” she says.“ I was extremely proud to be able to promote that and raise money for it.”
Calandrelli is among the select humans who have experienced space firsthand, but there is a growing influence of artificial intelligence( AI) in space exploration. She says while sending humans to space is fun and inspirational, robotic exploration can be much more practical.
“ A robot is cheaper, easier and sometimes faster to develop and send because you don’ t need to feed them,” she says.“ They don’ t need a bathroom and can work 24 hours a day. Robotic exploration is often a better bet, and that’ s why most of the exploration that we’ ve done throughout history has been with robots. It’ s just cheaper and easier.”
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