Tracy (Leavens) Van Houten

We gratefully acknowledge the outstanding achievements that Tracy Van Houten has made in the areas of Science and Public Service.  A spacecraft engineer for the past 15 years at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL),  Tracy has designed more than 100 mission concepts as the lead systems engineer of JPL’s Team X and has worked on four flight projects: Mars Science Laboratory; Soil Moisture Active Passive; Mars 2020; and the Europa Clipper System Testbed.  Tracy’s lifelong passion for mentoring has inspired her to recruit, hire, and mentor more than 75 interns and early-to-mid career employees, many of whom come from groups typically underrepresented in Engineering.   A lifelong public school advocate, Tracy has served as chairperson of the Engineering and Environmental Science Advisory Board at the local high school in her community.   Tracy earned her Bachelor’s Degree in Aerospace Engineering at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and her Master’s Degree in Astronautical Engineering at the University of Southern California.