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By Danielle Sempsrott
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida is playing a critical role in America’s return to the Moon – assembling, testing, and, ultimately, launching the rocket that will send the first woman and first person of color to the lunar surface. And Kennedy Associate Director, Management Burt Summerfield will be right there every step of the way.
Summerfield always knew he wanted to work in a career where he could help people and make a difference in the world. Now that is exactly what he is doing, executing key center decisions for a multi-user spaceport that employs more than 10,000 people and regularly ranks among the top places to work in the federal government.
“I have the great fortune of leading a diverse and talented workforce here,” Summerfield said. “And it’s even more rewarding knowing that everything we do benefits people on Earth. That’s true whether we’re launching a weather satellite, sending the next crew and their research to the International Space Station, or developing new technologies for growing food and exploring the lunar surface.”
Summerfield has spent nearly a decade overseeing the institutional functions at Kennedy, including medical, environmental, protective services, facilities maintenance, legal, and partnership programs in place, as well as managed the Center Management and Operations budget.
“If you think about it, we’re a city that runs 365 days a year,” he said. “Just like any other city, you have all kinds of issues that crop up. It’s something different every day, so it’s a lot of challenges, but it’s also fun.”
A Hampton Roads, Virginia, native, Summerfield began his career at Kennedy in 1982 as a contractor employee, working in environmental health and promoting a safe and healthy workplace for all employees. Seven years later, he was hired on as a NASA employee and moved into the biomedical office where he focused on pollution control and sanitation. By 1997, he was selected to help lead that office – a role he maintained until 2009 when, as the associate director of institutional services, he began managing the Florida spaceport’s institutional projects. He continued in that position for four years before assuming the centerwide role he holds today.
Summerfield was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, and grew up in Chesapeake. He attended Old Dominion University in nearby Norfolk, where he received a Bachelor of Science in environmental health. While working toward his undergraduate degree, he got his first experience working for NASA as an intern at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton. Summerfield said he thoroughly enjoyed living and going to school in this southeastern corner of Virginia, known as the Tidewater area.
“I wouldn’t trade the time I had growing up there,” he said. “It’s a magical place to grow up, in my opinion. There’s so much history and so many unique aspects of things around that I felt like it was a really special place.”
At age 21, just after graduating from college, Summerfield moved to Florida for a career opportunity at Kennedy.
“I never imagined working in the space field,” he said. “It wasn’t that I didn’t have an interest in the space program, because I did, but I never thought I would actually end up working in that field.”
Although his technical focus was on industrial hygiene, he went on to receive his master’s in business administration from the Florida Institute of Technology. Summerfield always thought he would end up somewhere in the medical field, but he said there is no place he’d rather be than where he is now.
“I know a lot of people I went to school with who have great jobs now, but none of them have been inside a space shuttle. None of them have been up close to the Hubble Telescope, or have been around so many kinds of spacecraft or launch vehicles. Now, I’ve got some friends who work on building nuclear aircraft carriers – they have pretty cool jobs,” he joked. “But I am proud that I have had the opportunity to work for NASA at Kennedy.”
Summerfield’s career at Kennedy has been a full one, allowing him to see a variety of spacecraft and rockets firsthand, but his all-time favorite memory at the Florida spaceport is meeting the woman who became his wife, Dianna. While nothing could top that memory, Summerfield said he looks forward to what the future at Kennedy holds.
“I’ve had some great opportunities in my career, and to be associated with the Space Launch System, the Artemis program, and Orion processing, and to be around the hardware that will take us back to the Moon is really a difficult thing to describe,” he said. “It’s a sense of pride and excitement rolled into one, because you’re doing something for your country that’s really keeping us out in the forefront of technology. Just knowing that you’re making a difference that people are going to read about in history books is an exciting thing.”