AUK was honored to welcome at AUK Campus a very distinguished speaker – Terry Virts, Commander of the International Space Station (2015), NASA astronaut, Сolonel (USAF retired), a guest-lecturer at Harvard Business School, and a filmmaker. He is currently working as an executive coach as well as advising businesses that focus on energy, aerospace, and technology.
This is the first visit of Terry Virts to Ukraine who came here as a volunteer withing the mission of Ukraine Focus bringing ambulances and evacuation vehicles to the frontline cities and town of Ukraine.
During offline AUK Talks «Leadership Lessons from Space», Terry Virts shared his fascinating experiences and journey as a NASA astronaut, which began as a childhood dream, his observations of seven months in space during his two spaceflights, commanding the International Space Station during Expedition 42/43 in 2014/2015, scientific experiments conducted on the space station, and environmental problems, most visible from the space.
Addressing the audience, Terry Virts highlighted the main lesson learned from his experience,
"I have career advice that I tell kids and adults. The lesson I've learned from my experience is: don't tell yourself "no". You will not obtain it if you tell yourself "no". If it's a big dream, it's gonna be hard to get. For example, if you want to go to medical school and acquire a degree, you must achieve good grades, pass the test, and perform a variety of other things. The bigger the dream, the more work you'll have to do. But the first step is not to tell yourself "no."
Astronaut Terry Virts commanded the International Space Station, and, while onboard the space station in 2015, he saw red flashes in Donbas, which were bombs exploding during the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Since then, he has become a strong supporter of Ukraine.
During offline AUK Talks «Leadership Lessons from Space», he also shared some details of life on the station while Russian aggression against Ukraine, and lessons learned during and after this tremendous experience.
«One time, I remember being on the station and thinking, "That's my planet, and I'm not on it." It was like, wow, I'm no longer on my planet. Earth has been around for billions of years, and it will continue to be around for billions more.
I am a big fan of democracy. I joined the Air Force when I was 17 years old to help defend Europe against the Soviet Union. And here we are in 2024, doing the same thing we thought was over.
What Russia is doing is evil. There's no black and white there. It's just evil. These are the things that I care about. Because human beings do evil, and this is not limited to Russia. This is human nature, and it always will be. That's the beauty of democracy. "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” It's Churchill's quote. We need to strengthen democracies to keep human nature in check. That's kind of my passion.
What I really want to do is thank you, Ukrainians. You're actually fighting for freedom. I want to thank you all for this, and it's an honor for me to be here."
Addressing Terry Virts, Oleksii Shershnov, AUK Vice President, outlined, "On behalf of AUK, our students, partners and faculty, let me thank you for standing with Ukraine and helping our country to win this war. We are happy to have you as Ukraine's Ambassador in the United States and in the world. Thank you for being a part of a new important mission of bringing ambulances to Ukraine these days."
We express our gratitude to Terry Virts for his insightful, powerful and engaging conversation with AUK students and guests, as well as to Oleksii Shershnov, AUK Vice-President, for moderating such a meaningful discussion.