How I Became an Aspiring Cosmologist: My 8th-Grade Spark | Muskan Jain

The Catalyst at 14 : The 8th-Grade Moment That Sparked My Journey to Cosmology

How a rural classroom, a science teacher, and a five-minute video of the International Space Station set an aspiring cosmologist on her path.

Some nights, I still stand outside and look straight up, asking the same question that has followed me for almost a decade: how did this universe begin, and how will it end?

It's a strange question for a teenager to carry. It's an even stranger one to carry growing up in a small rural school, where "space" mostly existed in textbook diagrams — not in real conversation.

But before I knew a single equation, before I understood what "research" even meant, before I had ever even heard the word cosmology — someone handed me a telescope I didn't know I needed. Not a real one. Just a phone screen, a science teacher, and one ordinary class in 8th grade.

This is the story of how my journey toward cosmology actually began — and the first post in a series about what it really takes to go from curious kid to aspiring scientist.

1          Growing Up in a Rural School: Where Practical Science Was Rare

I grew up in a rural area, where hands-on science education — real experiments, real practical work — wasn't something every student had access to. Most science classes ran on chalkboards, textbooks, and memorization, not curiosity.

I was lucky. My school made space for practical, experimental learning, which is genuinely rare in areas like mine. And I had a science teacher who believed in it — who didn't just want us to read about the world, but to see it for ourselves.

I didn't know it yet, but that one habit of his — showing rather than just telling — was about to redirect the entire course of my life.

2          The Moment Everything Changed: An 8th-Grade Science Class

We reached the final chapter of our 8th-grade NCERT science textbook — the one covering stars, planets, the sky, and the solar system. For most classes, this is the chapter that gets rushed through before exams. Not this one.

My teacher didn't just walk us through the diagrams. He pulled out his phone and showed us the International Space Station.

I remember watching astronauts eat, sit, and sleep in a place with no "up" or "down" — food floating, bodies drifting, every rule of daily life turned inside out. It sounds like such a small thing now. But sitting in that classroom, it was the first time the universe stopped being a chapter in a book and became real.

That was the spark. In that one class, without fully understanding what I was deciding, I made a decision that would shape everything after: I wanted to do something unique with my life.

3          From Curiosity to a Career Dream: Discovering the Word "Cosmology"

After that day, I couldn't stop exploring. I didn't have a clear path — I didn't even know what "research" meant yet — but I knew I wanted to be connected to space in some way.

Like a lot of kids with a space dream and no roadmap, I latched onto the only names I knew: ISRO and NASA. By class 10, whenever people asked what I wanted to become, I'd confidently say "ISRO scientist" — even though I had no real idea what that actually meant day-to-day. I just knew I wanted to be near the stars in some form.

The real turning point came almost by accident. On my birthday, March 7th, right before I entered class 11, I visited my neighbor's house. They handed me some old general knowledge (GK) books — the kind that usually just sit around collecting dust. I started flipping through one and found a chapter on space.

And there it was: the word cosmology, defined clearly for the first time, along with what cosmologists actually study.

That was my real "aha" moment. The ISS video lit the spark back in 8th grade — but this was the moment I finally had a name for the fire that had been burning in me ever since. This wasn't just about "working with a space agency." This was about wanting to understand the universe itself — its origin, its structure, its end.

4          Why Early Mentorship Matters More Than We Realize

Looking back, it's strange to think an entire life direction can trace back to one science class, one video of astronauts floating in a space station, and one teacher who cared enough to show it to us. He probably has no idea what that five-minute video did. He may not even remember it.

But I do. Every time.

That's the thing about early mentors and small moments of guidance — they rarely know the weight of what they're creating. A single video, a single old book handed over on a birthday, can quietly redirect the next ten years of someone's life.

Who was the person that unlocked your passion when you were younger? Share your spark story in the comments below — I'd love to hear it.

5          What's Next: The Struggle Years

I had the spark, and I finally had a name for it — cosmology. But knowing what you want and knowing how to get there are two very different things.

In the next post, I'll take you through class 11 and 12: the real struggle years, where the picture was still incomplete, my mental health was tested, and I had to find out whether my parents would stand behind this dream — or against it.

Continue to the next post: [Before the Cosmos: Class 11, Class 12, and the Fight for a Dream] (link when published)