We had a great event on March 2nd. UWWI, which is a program created by Eve Rivkin, an Engineering Professor at the UW, has Engineering women students come out to schools and talk to the girls about Engineering careers and their own stories. UWWI and IGNITE have a collaboration and will do more events like this in the future.
We had a fabulous event, in the library at Sealth where about 70-80 girls attended.
We want to thank the wonderful Engineering students, Julie Shi, and Ahimahz Ifaj Negash, who did a fabulous job sharing their story and answering the girls questions.
They have a great passion for engineering which was evident and the girls were so excited to hear more about engineering careers. WE will also post some pics on the website.
A big thank you to the dedicated IGNITE chapter leader at Sealth HS, DeAira Handugan. She has made sure Sealth girls get at least one IGNITE event a month. The girls share about IGNITE with their friends and now the turnouts are huge.
Thank you to DeAira for being such a great leader and supporter of IGNITE for the girls at Sealth HS. And another big thank you to Kate the librarian for being such a great supporter for IGNITE and closing the library for us whenever we do an event.
Also, I want to thank the front office support person Jenny Hernandez, who welcomes us and makes IGNITE feel so at home. She will also be supporting IGNITE anyway she can. She loves the program!
Here are the comments from the girls evaluation forms.
- I liked the guest speakers and what they shared about their careers. Everything was very good.
- The most interesting part was how the women explained what their position is in engineering.
- I liked the presentation and the information that I got. I also learned that technology and engineering are the fastest growing career fields in the US.
- I liked how the ladies talked to us about what they do for a living and how interesting they are. It’s super crazy how low the numbers are of women going into these careers.
- I really enjoyed the guest speakers, and hearing more about Engineering programs.
- I thought the Q and A was super helpful. And the pizza was yummy, thank you.:) I was sad to learn that only 10 percent of women are in engineering today 🙁
- I liked the questions and answers part a lot. I really liked hearing how they became interested in engineering. I learned that there are not many women in engineering and I think there is gonna be more in the future.
- When they were telling me how many different types of engineering, it was the best part. I thought I had to be a math genius to be an engineer, but I learned that it’s not true.
- I liked hearing the women’s stories and experiences.
- I enjoyed learning about all of the different jobs in Engineering. And I learned that I can get a good job with just a B.A, depending on what you study.
- I liked learning about all of the different engineering fields. It’s interesting and I didn’t know a lot of this stuff!
- The most interesting thing I learned today was that not many women are in engineering. Also that you get paid to do your Ph. D. in this field!!
- How inspiring every woman is because they are getting their Ph D’s. It was interesting that Chemical engineering is only about chemicals.
- I really got a lot out of learning about the different paths we can take.
Thank you for making this event possible.
Cathi Rodgveller M.S. Ed.
View the Chief Sealth High School chapter page