Xavier Williams, a junior in the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, was one of 35 students nationally to receive the fellowship, which includes a 10-week paid internship, scholarship and mentorship.

Xavier Williams won’t soon forget the sky.

As an elementary school kid living in Orlando, Florida, Williams and his classmates would be running around outside during recess, playing hoops, when they’d all just stop and stare.

Takes a lot to get an elementary schooler to stop.

A rocket streaking across the sky will do that.

The school was near enough to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center to see the remarkable, billowing trail of white but not quite close enough to experience the rest of the launch fully — the sound of the blast and the feeling of force required to get a million-pound, sophisticatedly designed rocket to defy gravity.

But that stop, that sight and the awe that accompanied it changed the trajectory of Williams’ life. He didn’t know how to define it then, but he started absorbing as much space media and games as he could, “Dune,” “Star Wars,” “Halo.” An “obsession,” he called it.

Williams will spend his 10-week internship with BAE Systems.

By high school, Williams had a name for that fascination: aerospace engineering. By sophomore year, he was writing a research paper on solenoids. By senior year, he was identifying the top colleges in the country for aeronautical and astronautical engineering. By spring senior year, he was stepping on Purdue University’s campus in West Lafayette, Indiana, and it was a “no-brainer.” This was home.

One that has afforded myriad opportunities in three years on campus, including a recent can’t-believe-it one.

In December 2024, Williams was notified he was one of 35 students selected as a Patti Grace Smith Fellow, an experience made available by a third-party fellowship outside of Purdue that includes an internship, scholarship, personalized mentor and rare community connection in a program designed to accelerate the careers of future aerospace leaders.

Williams is the sixth Purdue student chosen to receive the honor, joining Meredith Clark (2023 cohort), Armand Destin and Muyiwa Arowolo (2022 cohort) and Noah Herbert and Zion Moss (2021).

And, two months later, he still can’t quite believe it.

“I’m super excited for this experience,” said Williams, a junior in the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AAE). “This is my first actual aerospace engineering internship. I’m happy to continue this tradition of being one Purdue student every single year getting the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship.”

Williams joked the announcement felt like an NFL Draft experience. He was sitting in his room playing video games with friends when his phone buzzed and the caller ID said Colorado. It was in the middle of the day on a weekend, who could it be?

When he answered, he heard, “We’re glad to welcome you to the Patti Grace Smith family, and you’ve got an internship with BAE Systems.”

“I was ecstatic,” said Williams, smiling widely as he relayed the moment. “I was so not ready for it — I almost blurted out. During the interview with BAE Systems, it was five people on a roundtable, and (the person who called) said they said, ‘We’ve got to have this kid.’ I was like wow. I was so surprised.”

That call was only the beginning, of course.

Williams will begin that 10-week summer internship at BAE Systems in June in Boulder, Colorado. The global company was one of four he interviewed with during the process and was one at the top of Williams’ list because of its mission: BAE Systems provides some of the world’s most advanced technology-led defense, aerospace and security solutions, and Williams’ heart is for systems design engineering. Williams said one of BAE System’s “hallmark” positions is Systems Engineering Integration and Testing.

“I like the idea of systems engineering as a whole where you’re getting a huge conglomerate of different things, putting it together, making sure the resources are allocated properly, so that all that has to work, like cogs in a machine,” Williams said. “One thing I really like about systems engineering is you have to have a little bit of knowledge of every single part. If you’re supposed to be the person interacting with customers, every single part that makes up a plane, a jet, a rocket, you’re going to have to have a bit of knowledge to touch base with each other … At the end of the day, there are a lot of different goals that need to be met. The most important goal is that it will satisfy the need of the person purchasing the product.

“The primary thing I’m hoping to gain from the internship is real-world applicable industry experience in aerospace engineering. I’ll be able to see what it’s like at one of the most respected and top aerospace engineering companies in the world. I’ll be able to see if this is really what I want. This is the test — if this is where I feel like I belong and this all clicks for me. I believe and I hope so.”

Williams anticipates what he’s learned so far in AAE will be applicable this summer, and he’s already seen coursework pay off in landing the PSG Fellowship. During his interview with BAE Systems, he had a chance to share what he’d been learning in AAE 351000 (Aerospace Systems Design), and that knowledge “came in clutch.”

It’s not just coursework that is preparing Williams to be an aerospace leader of the future.

He’s intentionally varied interests — participating in the inaugural STARS program, working as a teaching assistant for ENGR 133, doing undergraduate research in AAE research assistant professor Zherui Martinez-Gou’s Impact Science Lab and serving as an informal tutor for the Minority Engineering Program (MEP).

Williams frequently can be found in MEP’s Academic Success Center (ASC), studying and encouraging other students. He’s quick to share advice especially with first-year students, especially things he’d wished he’d known back then: There are resources, take advantage of them; and be honest about struggles, ask for help.

“TAs aren’t here going, ‘Oh my gosh, I have to help this kid.’ We get paid to help you. We’re not here to judge you. I don’t think there’s any stupid questions, especially when you’re in one of the hardest majors in one of the hardest schools,” Williams said. “If you have questions, some of them you may think are stupid are fundamental to understanding the entire class. There’s no reason to put yourself behind or think you’re unteachable. If I didn’t go to office hours for so many of my classes, I don’t know where I’d be. I think tutoring and helping others is such a huge thing to getting by. As much as I thought I’d come here and breeze through because I thought high school was just it, I was the smartest kid alive, no, Purdue humbled me. College is a very different experience, and Purdue is a very challenging school. A lot of people have come in thinking the exact same thing. But it’s never too late to get help.”

Sharing those lessons inside ASC on the second floor in Lambertus Hall just may change the course of Purdue Engineering history — and beyond.

“Hopefully, I’ll be able to see the next student who (is a PSG Fellow) next year, before I graduate. Hopefully, it’ll be one of the people I mentored at MEP,” he said, smiling.

Williams had an opportunity to introduce AAE alumnus Travis Langster at a recent symposium.