Based in Washington, Jen manages Aviation Week’s worldwide defense, space and security coverage.
Prior to taking on her current role, Jen was Aviation Week's Congressional Editor. Jen came to Aviation Week in March 2011 from Politico, where she covered the intersection of defense and politics. She also worked as a reporter and editor for Defense Daily, Inside the Army, The Other Paper and The Columbus Dispatch.
Jen received a Master’s degree in journalism as a Kiplinger Fellow at the Ohio State University. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in history and journalism from the University of Michigan.
To alleviate concerns about U.S. reliance on Russian rocket engines, one House panel aims to provide the Pentagon with $220 million to begin developing a next-generation liquid rocket engine. The first draft of the fiscal 2015 defense authorization bill, which the House Armed Services Committee will debate May 7, is also calling for the Pentagon to complete development of the engine by 2019 through a full and open competition and make it available to all U.S. space launch providers.
NASA hopes its renewed long-term focus on human exploration of Mars will keep its programs moving ahead in the face of real-time upsets in the fiscal and political environment where it operates. Wherever they can find a pulpit, NASA managers have been preaching their “path-to-Mars” approach—“Earth-reliant” R&D on the space station, missions of up to a year in the “proving ground” around the Moon and “Mars-ready” human flights of as long as three years with the Orion/Space Launch System (SLS) combo.
