Hawthorne Tutors

About Hawthorne

Hawthorne, California, relatively unknown before the tech boom, is now a thriving community in Los Angeles County, home to aerospace industries, as well as Tesla motors, and other electronics manufacturing. Famous among these different industries is SpaceX, which is headquartered at Hawthorne’s own municipal airport.

SpaceX, formally known as Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, was founded in 2002 by entrepreneur Elon Musk with the goal of reducing space transportation costs and enabling the colonization of Mars. Musk, known as something of a visionary billionaire, established this corporation with the decline of NASA. Public funds for space exploration have slowly but surely dwindled as other priorities have taken shape. Private funds, however, are currently used to continue the research and forward-thinking exploration that characterizes the journey into space and the eventual arrival to Mars. Musk’s projects over the years have included goals to grow plants on Mars, provide consumer space travel at affordable costs, develop reusable launch systems, and eventually, establish permanent human colonies on Mars. SpaceX has conducted a series of successful rocket, satellite, and spacecraft launches. SpaceX has also successfully sent different crafts into the earth’s orbit since its founding in 2002.

The company has not been without any setbacks, however, with several rockets exploding or disintegrating at launch. The millions of dollars lost in these setbacks have not deterred Musk from pushing forward with his goals. He has successfully convinced investors and other companies to take part in SpaceX’s future, and it continues to thrive as a company today.

SpaceX Headquarters is located in Hawthorne, and has been since its inception. The large three-story facility houses SpaceX's office space, mission control, and vehicle factory. The area has one of the largest concentrations of aerospace headquarters, and facilities, in the United States. This is a lucrative place to work for recent college graduates looking to participate in the innovative and financially-satisfying industry of private aerospace development. SpaceX utilizes a high degree of vertical integration in the production of its rockets and rocket engines, building its rocket engines, rocket stages, spacecraft, principal avionics and all software in-house in their Hawthorne facility, which is unusual for the aerospace industry. Hawthorne should take pride in the fact that SpaceX, a company of universal, cosmic proportions, has chosen this community to make its home.

Musk’s vision is internationally known, not to mention the wealth he enjoys as result of his business ventures. Something important to remember in the story of SpaceX, however, is that it can take time and patience to achieve the success we desire. Moreover, that success can be elusive and inconsistent—it takes sustained efforts and persistent hard work, especially through lulls and setbacks. Musk’s determination is something to aspire to for all in Hawthorne—tutors and students alike. Tutors have visions of success for their clients, and struggling students can look to the work ethic of Musk to emulate in their own efforts to turn bad grades around.