About Joe Stehly

Joe Stehly earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and a master's degree in aerospace engineering from Missouri S&T in 2003 and 2004, respectively. A four-year letterman in track and field, he specialized in sprinting events and served as captain of the men's team during the 2002-03 season. Stehly was also a member of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. Beyond athletics, Stehly was active in campus life, serving as co-chairman of the Residence Hall Association in 2000-01 and as a member of the National Residence Hall Honorary.

In 2004, Stehly joined the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) as an aerospace engineer. Over the course of his career, he has contributed to numerous deep space missions including Deep Impact, the Spitzer Space Telescope, the Phoenix Mars Lander, the Mars Science Laboratory, the Europa Lander, and most recently, Europa Clipper, where he was the lead engineer during the implementation of the phase of the mission that successfully launched in October 2024. Today, Stehly serves as a section manager at JPL, where he oversees the work and careers of more than 150 engineers.