Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 7, 1992 TAG: 9202070273
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: MADELYN ROSENBERG HIGHER EDUCATION WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
ONE OF USA'S TOP 20
Susan Cox's favorite sweater, green, knit with a cow on the front, is a reminder of her past: a small dairy farm in Scott County.Her present and future are in the backpack, crammed with books and papers, that she totes to class or her engineering lab at Virginia Tech.
"I'm taking a light load this semester," she said. Light for Cox, anyway.
A senior in aerospace engineering who was honored last week for being selected for the All-USA Academic team, Cox is taking 14 credit hours, the lightest load she's had in her five years at Tech.
The judges chose 20 finalists from more than 1,200 undergraduates nominated by colleges and universities across the country. The selection was based on an evaluation of the students' academic records, service and leadership.
Cox, 22, did not talk much about the award during a recent interview. "It was a great honor," she said. But she wasn't in this for recognition, or even, really, for good grades.
"I know this sounds cliche," she said. "But I love to learn. To a large extent, learning is its own reward."
Perhaps that tenet was passed on from her mother, or any of the long line of teachers in her family.
Her parents had always pushed education, held it up like a beacon.
Regardless of her motto, learning has brought her some tangible rewards, most recently $2,500 from USA Today, a trophy, a luncheon and a trip to the White House for which Cox skipped classes, perhaps for the second time in her career.
President Bush, though, was out of town. "We didn't even get to see Millie," his dog, Cox said, her eyes clear, twinkling.
She has received recognition from her peers and from her professors.
"I was just in the process of nominating her for another award," said Bernard Grossman, associate department head for aerospace engineering. Over the years, he has worked with students like Cox who co-op, alternating semesters between college and working in "the real world."
There are several good students in the department, Grossman said, and Cox is one who stands out, who asks the probing questions.
She came to aerospace engineering, a field still dominated by men, quite naturally.
A science fiction lover from the time she was young, Cox always had an affinity for math and science.
"You can't have good science fiction stories without airplanes and rockets," she said. Her hope is to work on "hypersonic propulsion systems," in other words, very fast engines, something that will take a craft into the upper atmosphere.
She already has had tastes of the future, co-oping through the years at NASA's Wallops Island Flight Facility.
Her achievements there when she was asked to do an analysis of a rocket payload helped her earn the academic award.
The suspicion had been that the payload would fall apart and not make it into space.
Cox analyzed it, then made some suggestions of her own.
"Instead of marking it as hopeless, modifications were made," she said. It's scheduled to be launched from Alaska early this spring.
Cox has always been fascinated by space, and perhaps, someday, she will go there. But given a choice, she'd rather work on the equipment to propel others into space. Nothing personal against astronauts, she said. It's just that design is more "intellectually challenging."
Cox has a 3.8 grade-point average, but she does more than just study.
She still enjoys working with the calves back home and is active in the Wesley Foundation, a Methodist youth group.
On weekends, she hangs out with friends from the group or from her classes, trying to put schoolwork on the back burner. Sometimes, it creeps in, anyway.
Example: on a recent Saturday night Cox spent hours in front of the television with friends watching Star Trek. ("You cannot be in aerospace engineering without at least a moderate affection for Star Trek," she says.)
There was some debate about the fire extinguishers they used on the Enterprise. A friend said they would be outdated now, let alone then.
But Cox isn't picky. "I just love the story," she said.
Cox has learned, while in college, to strike a balance between her academics and social life.
It is something she takes from a freshman year when she was in honors calculus. "There were two students in the class who were brains," she said. "One scored straight 100s, the other scored straight 95s."
Cox spent the semester trying to break the 90s barrier.
"The professor used to take me aside and he would say: `Miss Cox, the smartest kid in this class is not the kid who makes all 100s. The kid who is the smartest is the one who makes 95s, because he studies enough to make that 95 and then he goes to sleep.' "
And so, with graduation around the corner, Cox is not burned out on school. She is ready for graduate studies, she said, perhaps at Tech, perhaps MIT or Cal Tech. She is not sure who will accept her.
In graduate school, she will again likely be one of the few women in her courses. But over the years, she's gotten used to it; she grew up knowing there is no such thing as "men's work" and "women's work."
It is something she learned on the farm.
"The farm is a practical place," she said. "There is work to be done and someone has to do it."
Her mother learned to drive a tractor at age 6; Cox learned when she was a little older.
Her father took over farm responsibilities at age 13. Before that, his older sister did the work while he worked in the house.
"Still, I'd like to see more women in engineering," she said. "I'd like to see more minorities, too. But I don't mind being one of 10 women in a group of 100. It doesn't bother me at all."