Michael Parkhill is a Native Texan who has been interested in space exploration since he was four years old. As a boy, he walked up to a statue of an astronaut in his Grandpa and Mother’s hometown of Shawnee, Oklahoma, and with curiosity asked his Mom, “Who is this?” She replied to him “That is Spaceman Gordon Cooper. He is from here in Shawnee.” Young Michael then paused and said “I want to be a Spaceman someday too.” From that point forward he was interested in space exploration and chose to pursue that endeavor with Aerospace Education being the primary means of achieving his dream of becoming an astronaut. He has been in education now for over twenty years attempting to educate others on the importance of spaceflight and exploration through STEM and outreach. Michael is currently an Aerospace Officer with the Texas Wing of the Civil Air Patrol--The United States Air Force Auxiliary with the rank/grade of Lt Colonel and is the Assistant Director of Aerospace Education for External Programs. He currently works with the NightHawk Composite Squadron in Denton, Texas and conducts presentations for schools and organizations in the Southwest Region. In 2008, he helped lead a High School student team in the “Classrooms in Space” program. Their team completed a Protein Crystallization Experiment at the NASA Marshall Spaceflight Center and launched it to the International Space Station on Soyuz TM-13 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. That same year, Michael was also selected with a team of NASA Texas Space Grant Consortium LiftOff Program Alumni Educators to redesign “The Lost Experiments of Challenger” that were originally designed to be flown by Astronaut & Teacher-in-Space Christa McAuliffe on the Space Shuttle. Michael and his students redesigned the Magnetic Chamber for the project. In 2009, he completed his NASA Physiological Training Course & Chamber Flight at the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston. He then conducted NASA Reduced Gravity Parabolic Flights as a Certified Crew Member and Payload Specialist for the Aircraft Operations Division. He was a reviewer for the NASA Texas High School Aerospace Scholars Program from 2015-17. Michael currently resides in Lindsay, Texas, with his wife and two sons.