Sharon Hagle is Board Chair and Founder of SpaceKids Global. Sharon completed her first spaceflight aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard NS-20, which launched on March 31, 2022, as a member of Crew 4. Joining Sharon on the flight was her husband, Marc Hagle, making them the first married couple to fly to space on a commercial vehicle. Sharon and Marc recently completed their second flight on Blue Origin’s NS-28, Crew 9, which launched on November 22, 2024, making them the only married couple to have traveled to space twice.
Founded in 2015, SpaceKids Global’s mission is to bring the possibility of space to kids everywhere by inspiring students to excel in STEAM+ Environment education, ensuring girls are equally represented.
SpaceKids Global hosts a variety of annual challenges designed to inspire kids to pursue careers in the space industry. One of the recent SpaceKids programs is a national competition titled SpaceKids Press Squad. Eight elementary students from around the country were selected to view Sharon’s launch to space from Blue Origin’s Mission Control and report on their experience. SpaceKids Global sponsors annual field trips to Kennedy Space Center for select fourth-grade students from Orange County Title I schools.
Sharon shares her journey to space and encourages students through speaking engagements at schools, nonprofit youth organizations, science centers, universities, and space organizations. To date, Sharon has reached over 1,000,000 students globally with the goal of helping fill the 3.5 million STEM job vacancies in the United States.
Sharon was recognized as one of Orlando Business Journal’s 2023 Women Who Mean Business, Girl Scouts Citrus Council Women of Distinction, and is the recipient of the UCF John C. and Martha Hitt Honorary Alumni Award, and the Clifford H. Lee Lifetime Achievement Award for her dedication to and achievements in philanthropy throughout central Florida. She has been a panelist and speaker at conferences around the world including the UK Space Agency, European Space Agency, Space Tourism Conference, Girl Scouts USA, and SpaceCom. She serves on the Purdue University Engineering Advisory Council.
Sharon had a decades-long career in commercial real estate as a site selector for national retail tenants in the southeastern United States. Sharon attended Morris Harvey College (now called The University of Charleston) in Charleston, W. Va.