Empowering Future Female Scientists: Founding She Leads STEM
Ellie Kim, Co-Editor-in-Chief
As a high school student, starting a non-profit organization was never something that was on my list of goals. I didn’t even think it was possible. However, during my junior year, I grew a passion for learning about the STEM gender gap and I realized all the ways which I could help bridge that gap in my own community.
I started reading about the STEM gender gap in the Science Research class with Dr. Schuchman (you can start taking this class your sophomore year). It was something I was always intrigued by, especially because science is my favorite subject in school. I remember reading about an experiment that was done where children were asked to draw pictures of scientists. There were only 28 pictures of a female scientist out of 4,807, and all of these 28 drawings were drawn by girls. Every fact I read about women in science made me more motivated to make a change in our community.
In developing my research project, I got the amazing opportunity to work with FestaVille to bring STEM activities to their summer camp. This was the official launch of my organization, and I received a $500 grant from an organization called GripTape to help me fund the project. Working with the kids opened my eyes to so many possibilities, and my ambitions grew even more.
I was lucky enough to work with such great friends at the start of my organization. Many students from North (and writers for the Ram’s Horn) came and helped me teach block coding, robotics, and engineering projects at FestaVille. It truly felt like we were building a community of people motivated to change the perception of higher education in STEM.
Images courtesy of Ellie Kim, Co-Editor-in-Chief
As a senior in high school, I am so excited to see what the future holds for me in college. I hope to continue to grow my organization, and my dream is to hold guest speaker conferences in person and have my very own STEM summer camp for girls. She Leads STEM actually got certified as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization a couple weeks ago, too. My hope is that every kid who is passionate about science will be told that they can become scientists, even girls from underrepresented groups.
Kate Mathis, Co-Web-Design Editor, helping out. She Leads STEM at FestaVille!
Maddie Flanagan, Copy Editor, and Ryan McGinley, Managing Editor, are also on the She Leads STEM team!
Check out a virtual event She Leads STEM is hosting soon!
Sign up with this link http://www.sheleadssteminc.org/slsconference.html
