Business grad’s career takes off

Bailee Cook’s first job out of CSUB: Procuring parts for the B-2 bomber

By California State University, Bakersfield

February 24^th, 2021

Bailee Cook is the 2021 Alumni Rising `Runner for the School of Business and Public Administration.

Bailee Cook can’t say a whole lot about what she does for a living.

It’s classified.

What Cook can say is that she is a subcontract specialist at Northrop Grumman in Palmdale, procuring parts and materials for the B-2 bomber.

Northrop Grumman calls the B-2 “a key component of the nation’s long-range strike arsenal, and one of the most survivable aircraft in the world” because it’s so stealthy.

“We’ve watched it fly and you don’t see it coming, it’s extremely flat,” Cook said. “You only really see it when it’s over on top of you. And then it disappears again.”

The job not only requires a B-2 clearance — even higher than a secret clearance — but for her to leave her cell phone and laptop behind when she goes into her work area at Plant 42, a U.S. Air Force-owned classified aircraft manufacturing plant that’s also home to Lockheed, Boeing and NASA.

Even more impressive? It’s her first job out of CSUB, and a career launched as a young mom.

Cook, 26, grew up in Victorville and moved to Orange County after high school. She got pregnant, endured a break-up, and then moved back in with her parents in the Antelope Valley to get help restarting her life and raising her son.

Cook enrolled at Antelope Valley College and majored in business, knowing there were many things she could do with a business degree. That includes working in aerospace, something she’d long been attracted to as someone with family members in the industry.

Cook earned her associate degree in business administration and management from AVC in 2017 and then enrolled in the business program at CSUB Antelope Valley.

“The professors were beyond amazing. I love them so much. And the staff alone was great,” Cook said. “To this day I’ve never had anything bad to say about CSUB. My time there was amazing.”

During her two years at CSUB, Cook juggled work at the Antelope Valley Board of Trade from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. and then class in the afternoon. It was tough leaving her son with her mother but knew that getting her education would secure him a better future in the long run.

It clearly did.

When it came time to apply for jobs toward the end of her two years at CSUB, Cook applied to everything business-related that was entry-level but required a college degree. Multiple interview requests and then job offers rolled in, including the one at Northrup Grumman.

“So I kind of just made a decision and went with it, and the rest is history,” she said.

Her advice to students? Apply for anything and everything. And be sure to check out opportunities in aerospace, which is “hiring like crazy,” Cook said.

Jobs are open not only in engineering but HR, nursing, hazardous materials handling and business. Companies have rotation programs in which they hire entry-level people for one job but later move them into others to determine the best fit.

“They’re really accommodating to what we actually want to do, and how we want to build our careers,” Cook said. “You think these huge corporations really only care about the executive levels. But they really care about the entry levels, too, and want you to succeed in your career, and they want you to be where you want to be.”