Close to 800 future aerospace and aviation professionals listened to Philippine Space Agency (PhilSA) Director General Joel Marciano Jr. as he spoke at the ALIAC Scientia Knowledge Hub webinar on 28 January 2021.

The Scientia Knowledge Hub is a scientific and technical conference for Airlink International Aviation College (ALIAC) students from the undergraduate programs and the Junior and Senior High School divisions. This year’s Scientia Knowledge Hub was held online.

Director General Marciano was the plenary speaker in the morning session where he talked about the charted course of the recently-launched PhilSA. The event also had Dr. Jayson Lo (Filipino motivational speaker) and Captain Jessica Cox (world’s first licensed armless pilot) as plenary speakers for the afternoon session.

During his talk, Dr. Marciano discussed the past gains made in space R&D investments and the PhilSA’s flagship projects, namely Mobilizing Space Data and Build, Build, Build in Space (B3iS).

Dr. Marciano also emphasized the importance of becoming a proverbial “T-shaped” person—having a depth of skills in one’s field of expertise (the “vertical bar”) while also acquiring a breadth of skills and the ability to collaborate across disciplines with experts in other areas and applying knowledge in areas of expertise other than one’s own (i.e., the “horizontal bar”).