Champions of Change: Girls and Women in STEM

Champions of Change: Girls and Women in STEM

Florence Nightingale, “The Lady with the Lamp”, famous nurse, feminist, and the first female member of the Royal Statistical Society, once remarked, “The progressive world is necessarily divided into two classes - those who take the best of what there is and enjoy it - those who wish for something better and try to create it.” “Were there none who were discontented with what they have, the world would never reach anything better.”

On Friday, December 9th, the White House hosted academic and industry luminaries for the “Champions of Change: Women & Girls in STEM” gathering.

As the Department of Commerce’s Economics and Statistics Administration states, “Our science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) workforce is crucial to America’s innovative capacity and global competitiveness. Yet women are vastly underrepresented in STEM jobs and among STEM degree holders despite making up nearly half of the U.S. workforce and half of the college-educated workforce. That leaves an untapped opportunity to expand STEM employment in the United States, even as there is wide agreement that the nation must do more to improve its competitiveness.”

Friday’s afternoon breakout sessions were filled with lively discussions amongst academic and industry thought leaders on how to attract and retain women and girls in STEM curricula and professions. Participants in the breakout session on retention discussed five areas where opportunities to influence women in STEM fields exist – distinct in the sense that the tactics are different though the goal is the same:

• K-12 – keep alive the “wonder” of STEM – polymers and gumdrops in the Tech Savvy program and using games to engage young women, as NetHope is exploring.A growth MindSet benefits young girls in STEM – teach children that they can acquire new skills, and praise effort.
• College – designing coursework that focuses on helping people rather than blowing up things. Baker Franke’s work is a great example.
• Recruiting and interviewing – selling the workplace environment and ensuring there is a diverse set of candidates for consideration. Two body opportunity – ensure there’s awareness of spouse/SO when hiring.
• Retention – no more “lonely and only” ! – budget specifically for community building efforts – ensure mentors, role models, and sponsors exist and are easy to find
• Retirement – Women going towards retirement and legacy-building – finding a systemic way to transfer knowledge to young and talented women – consciously and strategically looking forward to the next generation

A number of topics covered throughout the afternoon resonated as areas within academics and industry that we can address through action on women already working in STEM fields:

• Isolation – lonely and only – awareness, empathy, and inclusion – the 4 fingers in the room often don’t notice, but thumb sure realizes it’s alone and different. Feeling this is something everybodyfeels at times, but nobodyshould ever have tofeel.
• Envisioning, Mentoring, and Sponsorship – the power of seeing “someone like me” in a position I aspire to – someone available to assist, guide, and advise. The benefit of having that person available for mentoring and sponsoring. It’s important to have that all the way through the career life stages. Not just a high level executive, but a representative at each and every step of the journey.
• Culture – this tends to be a catch-all word – but “culture is created through actions” – and the impact of taking specific, tangible, and measurable actions towards a future state we want to achieve will create a culture of inclusion. Whether it’s a culture that rewards competition over collaboration, or a culture that exudes geekiness or lack of coolness.

Champions of Change Awards

“A country that gives girls equal opportunity has twice as much talent and brainpower to draw on and is likely to be more open and flexible in ways that promote international trade.” – Fast Company – December 2011

The following twelve local leaders in the effort to recruit and retain girls and women in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields were honored as White House

Champions of Change

Champions of Change list and bios

Bianca Bailey

Q. What attracted you to chemical engineering? A. Involvement with Girls Incorporated. On one of the Math and Science Family nights, I met a woman who became a mentor to me. I heard a stat that 1% of chemical engineers are African American women. What does that mean? – *I* am one of those 1%. Girls Incorporatedhas been a rock in my life. It’s important for us to talk to young girls. Girls Incorporatedcreates exposure, support and reality = success.

Barbara Bitters

Q. What should happen at the state level? (Wisconsin) A. Education, Workforce Development and Training – and Business and Industries – we tried to create a web portal for all things STEM. STEM is the best kept secret – no one knows. The portal enables collaboration – the role of both women and men in kinds of work, careers, education. States need to lead the discussion for local.

I hope someday we have a national portal for STEM equity. Many people have never thought about what STEM means. The mistake people make is that it’s for the best and brightest – we all need to have STEM skills now – it’s for everyone. People who hear those letters (S-T-E-M) and think, “I am not one of those, so it doesn’t matter – but it’s up to everyone to intervene in the enrollment trends. States have an important role - networking, technical assistance, inspiring people to come to the call.

Tamara E. Brown

Tech Savvy program in Buffalo, NY. “There here are 2 key issues – preparation and opportunity. Having fun – using hands-on workshops to expose girls to STEM career. We did work combining polymer chemistry, which they don’t know, and gumdrops, which they love. We did DNA typing and unearthing fossils. Provide support – 250 parents and teachers invest their time – to learn about how to be advocates and improve their classroom. AAUW research has shown shifting perceptions of confidence, leadership styles of men and women, lack of retention. We saw the importance of learning negotiating skills – we want girls to have better careers – negotiating, critical thinking. We have an opportunity to create culture change in society. These girls found ways to change their world. “

Angela Byars-Winston

“My interest is in studying people in context – particularly the cultural context of STEM. My question has been to understand the factors that contribute to interest in STEM. How can cultural, cognitive, and contextualvariables predict interest and retention in STEM fields? It’s likeThe Little Engine that Could – I think I can, I think I can– STEM students comfort level with people outside their own ethnic groups correlates - basic skills to be culturally competent. There is a significant contribution of outcome expectations – what is the cost benefit analysis of STEM investment for students. The draws are “I want to make a difference”, not “I want a big job” – self-efficacy, and outcome expectations. We want to provide evidence-based research and show that it’s working, and making the effort to understand what makes a difference. It’s hard to replicate and scale unless we know what works. The impact of a mentoring relationship is significant. We have created a long term mentor training program – why do we assume that scientists, of all people,know how to build relationships? – wrong. We can train people to be more effective mentors. “Entering Mentoring” is available online.”

Judit Camacho

“We have been exploring language barriers and issues with STEM – Our work in SACNAS–the Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Sciencestarted in the 1970’s. We are creating a community of Hispanic, Latino, and native American scientists. It’s not the intellectual, it’s about the human interaction. Science is both an intellectual and a human experience.”

Elizabeth Chatman

Q. What should be happening in classrooms to help teachers connect with girls?A. Typically, equity and access are over here (left side) and science and math are over here (right side). Values and belief systems that are embedded in many fields of scientific endeavors. If we look at our traits – that’s the complex identity we have, and for many of us, certain aspects of our identities are either ‘involved in STEM’ or ‘not involved in STEM’. Can teachers look at aspects of STEM and find if it’s a place that helps acknowledge who I am? Working on that with teachers is key to delivering a culturally competent pedagogy – and allow students to engage. We look a lot at belief systems and intelligence. Carol Dweck, author of MindSet, speaks of two camps –

In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits, and in a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point.

The heart of STEM is confusing – no one understands it, so we have to be comfortable with the unknown – and because it’s hard is not because I’m stupid, it’s because it’s hard. If we have a growth mindset, then I can learn, I can figure it out. Teachers can talk about it with students. Key to science and math teachers, praise the effort.

Teachers can talk about it with students. The key is for science and math teachers to praise the effort.

Baker Frankes

In the world of computer science - I am the 99% - I am a white guy – and that bothers me. I want Computer Science open to everyone and women are a part of ‘everyone’. I teach girls, but I don’t teach TO girls. The assignments are not “girl” assignments or “boy” assignments. I’m interested in perpetuating that “ANTI”-sentiment. I don’t give assignments about blowing things up or games – but my assignments about helping people, changing the world. Solving problems for everyone or helping everyone out.

Jennifer Harper Ogle

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One of the most successful techniques involves broadening exposure to STEM. For example, instead of describing “transportation engineering” , we can ask “how many of you have ridden in a car on a roadway?” – and engage the students in research around transportation safety. Instead of asking, “how many of you have been in a crash” – get them thinking informally about the research. With the Girl Scouts – even small Daisy Girl Scouts – they’ve heard their parents talk about the importance of seat belts, but teaching them so that they are interested enough to ask their parents in the front seat, “Mom, did you put on your seat belt?” Put information about your career to bring it down a level. WTS International – is an international organization dedicated to the professional advancement of women in transportation working to bring 25 girls and their mentors a background tour of the DC transportation system.

Elisabeth Hayes

A great way to engage students is to use games as non-standard curriculum. Games can get girls excited about programming and computer science. We can get them excited by using video games. Typically games are associated with young men, but now, everyone plays. Most of the popular video games today come with built-in modding tools. Vast communities exist online for people with a passion for modding. These communities share tips, advice, strategies, tools, and help to modify these games for other purposes. We’ve seen, from 5th grade all the way in to 12th grade, girls who didn’t even know what programming was when they started, raise their hands when asked if they wanted to take a class on programming – because they played these games. Curriculum is developed ad hoc – they learn how to structure learning, how to access communities, how to seek out help, how to take responsibility. They have shown how they learn on their own. We’ve heard [from Outliers] how it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert. You can get that inside the walls of a school , but only when students are motivated through passion and persistence.

Bobby Schnabel

Indiana School of Informatics has doubled the number of women enrolled in computing related majors in 18 months – from 75 to 150. It’s important to get involved during the recruitment phase – to reach out and influence things I’d call “the image” – ie: instead of the normal “job market is excellent” approach, talk about the ability to change society - as opposed to be Dilbert to these societies. We spend time looking at the curriculum – the sorts of assignments, etc. There are issues of support – Women in Computingand others. Next is actually walking the talk – give students an opportunity to engage. The final piece that’s important is to have leadership support.

Karen Thole

Karen discussed the Penn StateEngineering Ambassadors – 40 primarily women engineers who are taught advanced communication and leadership skills in order to travel to schools to talk to high school science and math students. There is great work from National Academy of Engineers on Changing the Conversation.” An engineer makes a world of difference. “ High school girls are hearing from college girls about STEM.

Avis Yates Rivers

It is important to understand the importance of these efforts – 1.4 million jobs are being created in tech over the next 5 years, and only 30% of those jobs can be filled by existing students. Global competition – if we are not doing enough to encourage people in general, and women in particular, then we, as a country are going to lose our position of competitiveness. It was encouraging to see young people when we toured Facebook – the average age is 28 – well, I have shoes that old – but we saw firsthand how to attract people to those jobs. Lonely and only no more.We are excited about the NC Witt Award –the award for high school students – it’s harder to get than it is to get in to Harvard. Check out NCWIT– top ten ways to retain tech women.

U.S Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra, who moderated one of the panel discussions, told a great story about two high school juniors at the Harker Upper School in San Jose, California, ShreyaIndukuri and Daniela Lapidous, who convinced their teachers to fund measurement of energy at their school. They discovered that the air conditioning in the gym was kicking on at 2AM every day, and they were able to save thousands of dollars with recommendations that came from their measurement work. They shared their story with thousands of people at Power Shift 2011, and then met with Aneesh and the Acting Under Secretary of Energy, ArunMajumdar, to discuss how to scale their wildly successful carbon-cutting projects across the country. Shreya and Daniela first shared their success with SmartPowerEd, and encouraged the White House to help schools across America reduce their energy use through simple and cost-effective measures.

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams. – Eleanor Roosevelt

As these inspirational folks have shown, we are fortunate to live in an age where the greatesthindrance to our potential as human beingsis our owncollective imagination. In contrast to the pre-historic versions of ourselves, who lived in caves and were threatened by natural predators, or the early pioneer settlers who perished from cold and disease, we live in an age of longer expected life spans.Today, anyone can walk into a library and access the latest from the world’s top thinkers, turn on a TV and see world events as they happen, log in and visit with 1000 “friends” simultaneously, or visit an internet kiosk and change minds across the planet. As a species, we can revel in the magic that Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathilluminations bring to us each and every day.And, while we continue to evolve, it seems obvious to me that our future as humans is dramatically - if not exclusively - influenced by advancements across these four STEM areas. It’sostensibly unnatural – and risky – that we seem to be encumbering progress by limiting contributions by more than half of our population– and an afternoon at the White House hearing about twelve incredible Champions of Change can teach us all a few things to make our world better place. As Socrates taught, “all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice and experience of them.”

Links and References

Educate to Innovate

Department of Education Race to the Top

Role models – appointment of female leaders to head major government agencies

EPA Lisa Jackson,

NOAA Jane Lubchenco

USGS Marcia McNutt

DARPA Regina Dugan

Women in STEM speaker’s bureau

White House Council on Women and Girls

Google Science Fair winners

WIRES – Women’s International Research Engineering Summit

National Science Foundation’s Career Life Balance Initiative

Dow Chemical –Future We Create: Women in Chemistry in Science

Department of Labor Women’s Bureau

Department of Transportation Disadvantaged Business Enterprise

National Girls Collaborative Project

American Society of Mechanical Engineers

Society for Women Engineers

Girls Incorporated

NDIA BISEC