Prepare to welcome NASA’s latest generation of Artemis astronaut candidates, a group of ten exceptional individuals, including two Eagle Scouts: Jack Hathaway, Commander, U.S. Navy, and Christopher L. Williams, Ph.D. Get to know more about the accomplished members of this graduating class.

On Tuesday, March 4, at 10:30 a.m. EST, NASA will celebrate the candidates in a graduation ceremony at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX. Following the ceremony, at 11:45 a.m., NASA will engage in a Q&A session with students and media in the audience. You can watch both the ceremony and Q&A session on NASA+, NASA Television. 

During the ceremony, each candidate will be presented with an astronaut pin, symbolizing their graduation from basic training and their eligibility to be selected for space missions. This includes assignments to the International Space Station, future commercial destinations, missions to the Moon, and, ultimately, missions to Mars. 

Meet the Eagle Scout NASA Astronaut Candidates:

Jack Hathaway, Commander, U.S. Navy

• Eagle Class of 2000, Troop 0186, South Windsor, Connecticut
• Hathaway holds bachelor’s degrees in physics and history from the U.S. Naval Academy Maryland.
• He earned a master’s of science in flight dynamics from Cranfield University in 2014 and a master’s in national security and strategic studies from the U.S. Naval War College.
• Hathaway graduated from Empire Test Pilot’s School in 2011, Fixed Wing Class 70.
• He has spent over 2500 flight hours in 30 aircraft and completed more than 500 carrier arrest landings and 39 combat missions. 
• Selected by NASA to join the 2021 Astronaut Candidate Class.
• Learn more about Hathaway here.

Christopher L. Williams, Ph.D.

• Eagle Class of 2001, Troop 0773, Potomac, Maryland
• Stanford University graduate, Palo Alto, California, with a bachelor’s degree in physics in 2005.
• He earned a doctorate in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 2012, with research focused on astrophysics.
• Williams is a board-certified medical physicist, completing his residency training at Harvard Medical School, Boston, before joining the faculty as a clinical physicist and researcher.
• William served as the lead physicist for MR-guided adaptive radiation therapy. This research focused on developing image guidance techniques for cancer treatments. 
• Selected by NASA to join the 2021 Astronaut Candidate Class.
• Learn more about Williams here. 

Photo credits:
Portraits: ROBERT MARKOWITZ NASA-JSC