Charity Asuquo Ikpe is the Founder of Engineers In Heels Global, a Chicago based STEM organization, created to expose underrepresented students to STEM education within USA and Africa. She is a current staff of Boeing Company and serves as an F/A-18 Structure Analyst. She received her Bachelor's and Master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering, from the University of Maryland, College Park.
Ms. Charity worked for NASA Goddard Space Flight Center for 8 years before moving to the Chicago area in 2010. In 2005, she was involved with Space Shuttle Discovery launched on the historic Return to Flight mission, STS-114. She also worked 5 years as a thermal structural Analyst on James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).
From Nov 2012 – Dec 2018, she took 6 years off her hectic schedule to start a family. During that time she reinvented herself, founded Engineers in Heels as well as accepted a part time opportunity as a Technology Instructor at Koreas School (part of a Greek Orthodox Church out in Palos Hills, IL). There, she taught technology to students from preK-3 to 8th grade. The summer of 2018, as part of Engineers In Heels Global initiative, she traveled to Nigeria and ran STEM Camps teaching computer coding to grade school students and eventually her organizations adopted one of the poorest school in the region.
Ms. Charity was born in Akwa Ibom, Nigeria and at the age of you 6, her parents moved to Washington DC, USA along with her 2 siblings in pursue of higher education. She desires to ignite a passion for STEM in students and present them with opportunities to contribute to the advancement in technology. Ms. Charity serves as a speaker at STEM conferences and currently a Board member of her children's school PTA