Celebration was in the air at Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute (SIPI) this past April. A team of students from the Albuquerque, N.M., school had topped 20 other college teams to win the NASA Swarmathon. In this lively robotics competition, teams from minority-serving institutions develop computer code used by swarms of robots in an arena to autonomously find and collect the most resources. More than 500 students participated in this year’s event at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Kaleo Norman graduated with a degree in electrical engineering, full of excitement at the promise of a career in his field. Still, it took almost two years before he found a role in a professional workplace that allows him to follow his passion for engineering. But for him, it’s all been worth it, and he’s happy to share what he’s learned. “If you’re pursuing something that you enjoy but are going through a struggle,” he says, “don’t ever give up.”

Cherise John can recall the exact moment that inspired her to become an engineer. Growing up in Fruitland, N.M., she lived between two mine sites and two coal-fired power plants, whose pollution created acid rain. “One day, my childhood preconceptions of a perfect world were shattered when my father wouldn’t let me drink rainwater from a cup I had set out,” John explains. “My first thought was, ‘What can we do to stop this so I can drink my rainwater?’”

Jada Johnson grew up in Cloquet, Minn., which she calls “a smaller town, but bigger than most.” Even though she says there isn’t a lot to do around Cloquet, Johnson, Ojibwe, stays busy with extracurricular activities. As an added bonus, the organizations Johnson is a part of often allow her to travel beyond her home-town. “I’ve always been involved in things like science fairs and Upward Bound that take me places,” she says.

Growing up in rural Washington State, Johnny Buck spent most of his time outside, on the banks of the Columbia River. Over the years, he began to notice that the traditional foods and plants his family and their community relied on were beginning to die off and experience extreme shifts in their growing seasons. It was these changes that pushed Buck to pursue a dream he didn’t even realize he had: researching plant phenology — the study of periodic biological phenomena in relation to climate conditions — to contribute to solving challenges around biodiversity.

When Rebecca Price first enrolled at Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute (SIPI), she went in with a tentative plan to get her associate’s degree in business administration. But by the time she left her student orientation, she had changed her mind. Inspired by what she heard about the science department, including NASA-funded projects and student internships, Price chose to go in a completely different direction. She decided then and there to pursue a dual major in pre-engineering and AutoCAD, which meant getting her computer-aided drafting and design certificate.