at West Point. In 1957, White read an article about the astronauts of the future, and decided to become one. He believed that getting an advanced degree would improve his chances of being selected. Aldrin later recalled that White convinced him to follow this path as well. In September 1958, White enrolled in the University of Michigan under Air Force sponsorship to study aeronautical engineering. His classmates included James McDivitt, Jim Irwin and Ted Freeman. White was awarded his Master of Science degree in 1959. After it became clear that being a test pilot would also improve his chances of being selected to become an astronaut, White attended the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, California, with class 59-C, which graduated in July 1959. McDivitt was one of his classmates. White was assigned to the Aeronautical Systems Division at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. There, he did flight tests for weapons development, and helped make recommendations for aircraft design on aircraft such as the Fairchild C-123 Provider, Convair C-131 Samaritan, Boeing C-135 Stratolifter, the North American F-100 Super Sabre, Convair F-102 Delta Dagger and Lockheed T-33 Shooting Star. As a weightlessness- and extended-flight-training captain, he piloted the planes that were used to train astronauts in weightlessness. His passengers included John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, and Ham, the first hominid in space. During his career, White would log more than 3,000 flight hours with the Air Force, including about 2,200 hours in jets. NASA career Gemini program White was one of eleven pilots whose names the Air Force submitted to NASA in 1962 as potential candidates for the second group of astronauts. He was then selected as one of 32 finalists who would undergo medical and psychological examinations at Brooks Air Force Base in San Antonio. White arrived at the Aerospace Medical Center at Brooks AFB on July 30, 1962. He ran around the perimeter of Brooks every day during the testing to keep in shape. White was one of nine men chosen by NASA as part of Astronaut Group 2 in September 1962. Their selection was announced at a press conference in Cullen Auditorium at the University of Houston on September 17, 1962. Like their predecessors, the Mercury Seven, each of the new astronauts was assigned an area of specialization within the manned space program: in White's case, flight control systems.