Tufts student named Patti Grace Smith Fellow

Daniel Opara, E25, EG26, was selected as a Patti Grace Smith Fellow for Summer 2025. Named after Patti Grace Smith, a notable leader in commercial space transportation, the program supports Black undergraduate students who are seeking their first aerospace internship experience.

The program connects aerospace companies with interested and qualified students to take part in internships. Participating companies receive a shortlist of vetted candidates and make final selections through their internal hiring processes. This year, 35 undergraduate students from 24 universities were named fellows.

Opara spent the summer working as a guidance, navigation, and controls engineer at Draper Labs, a nonprofit engineering company focused on advancing technology at the intersection of government, academia, and industry. His work involved developing and refining navigation algorithms to support precise vehicle positioning and trajectory estimation. Opara benefited from Draper’s expertise in spacecraft guidance in tandem with mentorship from industry and peer mentors with the Patti Grace Smith program.

At Tufts, Opara completed his undergraduate degree with a double major in computer science and astrophysics. Outside the classroom, he was deeply involved with the Tufts Students for the Exploration and Development of Space (SEDS), a student organization affiliated with SEDS-USA. Through hands-on projects and outreach activities, the group empowers young people to participate in the space industry and promote space exploration.

Opara served as the webmaster and weather balloon project team lead for Tufts SEDS. The weather balloon team conducts experiments in near-space conditions and is currently adapting a gamma-ray spectrometer to collect data at high altitudes while exploring affordable ways to gather data on black holes. He also led avionics for the rocketry team where he designed embedded systems and refined control mechanisms for team projects.

The fellowship is an important stepping stone for Opara as he builds his career in the aerospace industry. In Fall 2025, he will return to Tufts to earn a master’s degree in mechanical engineering through the fifth-year master’s degree program. As he pursues his graduate education, Opara plans to build on the skills he gained during his undergraduate degree and the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship.