Mizzi's path to Purdue sparked by WiE outreach event
Abby Mizzi snagged the cow stuffie.
May not seem like much, but the choice signified the choice.
The black-speckled cow — Mizzi’s favorite animal — was wearing a Purdue University shirt.
And that was that.
Even though she hadn’t applied yet, Mizzi’s junior year visit to the campus in West Lafayette confirmed what she’d realized a year earlier: Purdue was it.
The sophomore year trip a couple hours down the road from her Chicago suburb home, with younger sister Alyssa in tow and dad Ralph behind the wheel? That was an exploration. (Beyond Ralph taking a wrong turn just a few miles from campus, leading to a detour in the dark.)
That trip in the winter of 2019 was for the Women in Engineering (WiE) Program’s outreach event that introduces ninth and 10th graders to engineering.
As soon as Abby articulated as an eighth grader, “I want to build airplanes,” Dad was on a mission to find where and how his oldest daughter of three could do just that. As an electrical engineer, he knew the qualities needed to thrive in engineering — and he knew then Abby had them. It was much more than a love of math and physics — which she had — but a drive, determination and ability to manage time well.
So Ralph did his research, like any engineer worth anything does, and found WiE’s outreach event. He registered the sisters for the daylong event, which promised exactly what the title said: to introduce young people to engineering. The event has been doing that since 2006, and the 2026 installment on Feb. 21, 2026 is open for registration.
After an introduction session that includes a brief overview, students are divided into groups. The icebreaker session is first, then the introduction to engineering and its concepts follow with participants engaging in hands-on activities.
“That (event) put Purdue on my radar,” Abby Mizzi said. “That was my first visit, and it was such a lovely visit. Talking to all the students was so fun. We were doing the activities in the circles with our group, doing the different challenges and things. I really loved that.”
The event gives prospective college students an opportunity to speak with current engineering students, too, and that element was a difference maker for Mizzi.
She got connected with an aeronautical and astronautical engineering major, and in the course of what Mizzi remembers to be a long conversation, the Purdue student said, “I fly airplanes in my free time.”
Say again?
“She was a student pilot,” Mizzi recounted, “and she’s like, ‘There’s an airport right here that you can fly out of.’
“I was like, ‘What?’” Mizzi’s inflection adding an exclamation point there, too. “'That’s awesome.’ That was on the list, too, of good things (I wanted), to have an airport for students to fly at. That was a plus for Purdue.”
That event established absolutes: Engineering is really cool; Purdue has an airport; and the students are really nice.
The next visit was an “official” one, with an actual campus tour, checking out the Honors College, gathering more information to make the college-destination decision. The lines already had been drawn. Circles, more accurately, as in Ralph Mizzi doing a six-hour-drive radius limit for his oldest’s choice, based on her interest to stay closer to home.
No worries — the perfect fit was well within range.
“After that visit, I remember being very much like, ‘I want to go to Purdue,’” Abby Mizzi said.
So she headed to a campus book store, determined. And found a cow. And bought it.
“I never bought a stuffed animal for any of the other universities I toured,” said Mizzi, who loves cows because they’re “whimsical and funny animals” that also happen to be pretty common in the Midwest, which means she always sees them on road trips.
“I remember after that second visit (feeling), ‘It’s ideal.’”
A seeming lifetime since that visit, Mizzi’s thoughts haven’t changed about Purdue, now her alma mater.
She reflects about the value of WiE, having soaked up every Access Alum event she could attend her first two years at Purdue; taking copious written and mental notes listening to all the wisdom shared by alum speakers in ENGR 194000; and, naturally, volunteering to share joys of engineering with prospective engineers through Exploring Engineering.
“I feel like the Women in Engineering Program offered a lot of different, unique community (opportunities),” she said.
Now, Mizzi is happy and thriving as a master’s student in the School of Aeronautics and Astronautics, the same school that stamped her bachelor’s degree last spring. And there are even greater heights on tap.
Really high heights.
Beyond Earth’s atmosphere heights.
In September 2025, the university announced Mizzi will be part of an all-Boilermaker crew aboard a Virgin Galactic suborbital spaceflight, dubbed “Purdue 1.” The flight will allow Mizzi and crew to test experiments in microgravity. Expected launch is 2027.
By then, Mizzi may be a two-time Purdue Engineering degree holder. And, as soon as the next-generation Galactic spaceship lands, she will add another title: a member of Purdue’s Cradle of Astronauts.
Maybe a certain guest will be a stowaway? The cow is “safe and sound” at Mizzi’s parents’ house.
“It would be pretty cool to use my cow as the Zero-G indicator on the flight,” Mizzi said.
