"Which Dr. Santiago?"

Born in the United States but raised in the Philippines, Santiago-Bond never thought that she would one day work for an international space program. Her family moved back to Antipolo, Rizal, when she was two months old; and the country’s own space program (or lack thereof) isn’t really what you would call a source of inspiration for a young girl to get into astronomy. She didn’t even think of going into the sciences, even though she came from a family of scientists.

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"I would answer phone calls and have to ask the caller 'Which Dr. Santiago?' because my parents and later, both my sisters, were doctors of some sort. Their curiosity and work ethic most likely rubbed off on me, but their professions did not speak to me," she tells us. With this background, it was only a matter of time before she attended Philippine Science High School where she took more units of science and math than the average high school student. Still, she had no intention of taking up an engineering course in college until an older schoolmate swayed her into applying to the University of the Philippines’ Electronics and Communications Engineering program.

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Math "got exponentially more difficult" as she advanced into the five-year program. "I had to crawl my way through some of the courses, but I wasn’t going to give up on [Electronics and Communications Engineering] because of a few bad grades," she narrates. Clearly, math can be unforgiving even to the best of us.

"In between my fair share of socializing, I practiced solving math and engineering problems until I was either confident enough to take the test or ran out of review time. There were lots of sleepless nights, but strong friendships were formed, and my persistence eventually paid off," she continues about her life in college.

"I had to crawl my way through some of the courses, but I wasn’t going to give up on [Electronics and Communications Engineering] because of a few bad grades," she narrates.

After graduation, she moved to the U.S. and started earning her Master’s Degree in Electrical Engineering from South Dakota State University. It wasn’t until a couple of years later, in 2003, when her graduate adviser gave her the option of working for the summer at the John F. Kennedy Space Center (K.S.C.). "I had zero knowledge about space shuttles, and did not even know that there was an International Space Station orbiting above us. I was just happy to take a break from South Dakota," the engineer confesses. But that summer break turned into a graduate cooperative internship, which allowed her to alternate semesters of studying and working at KSC until she graduated in 2005. By then, she was ready to take on a full-time job at the space center.