By Ignacio Ramos, Space Camp Alum
Sometimes a single week can change an entire lifetime.
For many, Space Camp is just one week in the summer. For others, it’s simply another fun activity.
For me, it was — literally — a dream come true. A caress to my past self. A once-in-a-lifetime experience that I will never forget.
It wasn’t just a week of learning “astronaut stuff” or basic rocket science; it was an experience that brought me closer to aerospace and helped me define my future. Now, I know with certainty: I am going to be an aerospace engineer.
At camp, I met people who shared the same passions as me — something I never thought was possible, at least not in Uruguay — and I had the chance to share my culture while learning from others.
Maybe for Americans, it is common to see amazing planes, enormous rockets, and advanced technology. But for me, it was unforgettable to witness, for the first time, the very machines that shaped the world we live in.
Since I was little, I wanted to study how rocket engines worked, how they were built, and why they were so powerful. I remember printing color images of rocket engines from the school library, spending all my credits just to have them. What I never imagined was that years later, I would be standing right in front of those very same engines, at the Davidson Center, framed exactly as they appeared in the images I had once collected at ten years old.
Maybe it sounds strange, but when I first entered the Saturn V Hall with my teammates and looked up at the gigantic Rocketdyne F-1 engine, my eyes filled with tears. Perhaps for some, that seems embarrassing. But in that moment, I remembered everything it took to get there —the sacrifices my parents made to buy my plane ticket, the hours I spent as a kid imagining myself at Space Camp, the projects I worked on, the problems I tried to solve.
Needless to say, everyone has their own battles and their own story. So do I. Maybe you think it’s not that hard for a 17-year-old to win this scholarship, but this 17-year-old was once a 12-year-old struggling to write essays, searching on Google “how to use the scientific method,” and even giving up having friends to keep pursuing ideas and projects.
Space Camp wasn’t just an experience — it changed the way I think, and it changed the direction of my life.
On this journey, I met incredible people (many of whom I’m still in contact with), and I learned some of the most valuable lessons of my life. Maybe for you, it was just a scholarship, just a sum of money. But for me, it was the best thing that has ever happened to me.
Thank you — truly. I hope all the good you gave me comes back to you. And I know it will.
