WiTT News

The 17th Annual TWISTER STEAM Conference was held on April 6th at Adventure Science Center where 38 professional women across STEAM backgrounds came together to present hands-on sessions to high school students to give these young ladies an experience of “a day in the life of” their particular career field.

Over 60 students attended the day long event where they experienced 4 different sessions, interaction with the all the volunteers, meeting new friends, photo booth fun, taking home cool door prizes and great memories! Cheryl D. Mayes, MBA was the keynote speaker kicking it off on ‘Building Your Personal Brand’.

Two high school seniors were awarded a scholarship based off their essay entrance where they addressed these questions, “As you look to enter college and then the full time workforce, what technologies will you focus on and what problems do you plan on solving through technology? And how? How will this scholarship help you achieve this goal?”

The winners…

• WiTT $5000 scholarship was awarded to Jessica Shields.
• Asurion $2500 scholarship was awarded to Tatyana Natal.

WiTT has partnered with Adventure Science Center for years to assist with the event in many ways beyond the scholarship by participating on the committee, helping with recruiting speakers as well as volunteers. This event is one of our most important and impactful Outreach initiatives.

We are lucky to receive handwritten notes from the students we work with, telling us about how that experience shaped them.

Between the lines, we see those moments of awe, inspiration, and gratitude to a new exposure and a new experience. Taking students into a journey that goes beyond just using technology but rather creating with it and loving it.

This year, we took part in the global movement “Hour of Code” at Head Middle Magnet School. We visited students in their classroom to engage them with hands-on activities, giving them the opportunity to learn how to code while encouraging them to start seeing coding as a new form of expression and a new context of learning.

The session was fun and inspiring, so their sponsoring teacher followed up with the below thank you note:

“I wanted to follow up with you today to express my sincere thanks for the great opportunity to engage my 8th grade students with technology and coding. They were still talking about your session today.

When you entered our room on Friday, students had mixed thoughts. Only a few of them had exposure to coding in the past but found what they learned awesome!

Sharing your experience with them and your career path was a great advantage. A few of the students wrote messages to you that I would like to share. The letters are handwritten from each student.

Again, thanks for the energetic session that has sparked an interest like none other.”

We are honored to serve the children in our community and, hopefully, sparking in them a love of tech.

WiTT's 2019 Board of Directors

Thank you to our members for voting in our 2019 Board election. We are pleased to announce our 2019 Board of Directors. 

All of these women are committed to WiTT's mission of providing technology leadership to women, providing options for women in technology to give back through community involvement, and encouraging young women to pursue careers in technology.

We also want to extend a special thank you to our outgoing Board members, Rebekah Panepinto and Betsy Wright, for their hard work and dedication to WiTT!

Marla Lamont, President

Meg Chamblee, Vice President

Beth Hoeg, Immediate Past President

Christine Smalley, Treasurer

Lurleen Sargent, Secretary

Juliet Orgain, Membership

Julie Danielson, Outreach

Kathryn Acord, Programs

Lane Harbin, Marketing

Amy Harris, Scholarships

Katie Prevost, Sponsorship (New role)

Joumana Rahime, Member at Large – Outreach

Deanna Steele, Member at Large (New board member)

Brian Moyer, ex officio Nashville Technology Council

Register!

It is very rewarding seeing young girls exploring STEM through engaging hands-on activities to find excitement and passion for fields they would not have learned about without the opportunities WiTT and our volunteers are providing. 

Here is what Janice Wildrick, an Android Developer, had to say after volunteering at Girl Power Camp:

“What an amazing experience volunteering at the Girl Power Camp! The memory that will stay with me the longest was one particular table of girls. As I was handing out the circuitry parts, each of the girls at the table said she was bad at engineering.  

As I worked with them on and off through the lesson, we talked a lot about how engineering (and STEM overall) isn't about getting things right the first time. What makes a person good at engineering is getting something wrong and going back to it over and over again until they figure out why it was wrong and how to make it right. 

At the end of the lesson, one of the girls at that table was the only one in class to have successfully inserted an on/off switch in her circuit. She was humble about her success but the pride in her eyes was undeniable; she was beaming.  

Amazing the power of a single hour and a bit of encouragement to change a girl's belief about what she can or can't do. Thanks again for the opportunity to volunteer. It was fantastic!”

When creativity merges with science, talents and untapped passions are discovered. During the three-day wearable technology workshop, a group of middle and high school girls began to develop and utilize creative, digital skills through the creation of tech-based projects. 

Ahmed Baali, Field Engineering Investigation from Nissan North America, visited our STEM workshop to speak about the implementation of technology in the automotive industry. The students were engaged and inquisitive, which is indicative of interest and newfound passion. 

We hope that, by raising awareness and providing such opportunities, more young girls will enter the STEM field in the future. STEM is a dynamic field, and to guarantee success in the modern world, we must inform the youth of the importance of technology.

Feedback from Students

“I have always been interested in the medical field since I’ve never been exposed to engineering. However, after this camp I will be considering engineering. This camp was awesome, and I learned so much while having fun. I would want students in the schools to learn how to put lights and sounds into card-making. It was such a cool way to express our creativity and design through the engineering design process”. Ramya Vadapalli, 10th Grade, Ravenwood High School

“I loved this workshop more than I thought I would. I am glad my mom made me come. The part I liked the most was when we made our own stuffed object and we put LED lights in it wherever we wanted it to light up”. Kevelyn Syas, 11th Grade, Oakland High school

“I really liked this session, it opened new doors that I didn’t even know were possible and I had so much fun while doing so. My favorite part was sewing my car together and seeing it light up. Overall, it was an experience that I definitely recommend.” Sloane Chestler, 10th Grade, Ensworth School

Join us at INTERFACE Nashville 2018 September 13th, 2018 WITT invites you to attend a CPE-accredited educational conference for IT professionals focusing on the latest developments in this constantly changing information technology environment. As a key-influencer on the evaluation of IT solutions, INTERFACE was developed for you. Click here for more information and to register.

Microsoft DigiGirlz Day is a one day event held at Nissan North America’s headquarters designed to provide middle and high school girls with a better understanding of what a career in technology is like and offer them the opportunity to interact and connect with businesses, organizations, and professionals from the IT industry.

WiTT participated in two important ways: our Member at Large for Outreach, Joumana Rahime, spoke on a panel about her experience as a woman in the technology field and inspired more girls to pursue their passion for tech.

WiTT also had a booth in the career exploration portion of the day and shared the variety of opportunities WiTT offers, from scholarships to connections and ongoing education. What an exciting event to be part of. We definitely plan to make participate again next year!

We are so excited to kick-off this program and so are these young females! We meet at Lipscomb University on March 21st to meet the mentees and introduce them to their mentors.

We have 9 mentees so far and 8 mentors and so appreciative to these volunteers who will have a huge impact in the lives of our future Tech Leaders. You will have the opportunity to meet our mentees at future WiTT meetings as well as can volunteer to be a mentor if this is an area of passion for you. If you would like to learn more please reach out via the WiTT Website under Outreach. We would love to have you as we progress forward with this program and very confident it will continue to grow.

A special thanks to Emilie Francis, WiTT Coordinator, and to our Lipscomb team, Shawna Denny, Administration & Coordination and Brett Ramsey, Associate Director Computing & Technology Recruiting as we could not have done this without them.

Teen Tech week was a great success. With the support of our awesome volunteers, we were able to respond to four different schools in the Metro Nashville Public Schools, ran 8 different sessions, and provided opportunities to over 200 young girls to explore the word of Technology. The girls had the chance to interact with professionals from the industry and engage in various STEM-based activities. Amanda Bell from Jackson National, Talia Di Domenico from Plow Group, and Allison Klingelhoets from Tractor Supply assisted with coding activities introducing students to the basics of HTML and CSS while building their very first webpage portfolio.

Other activities included basic circuitry and electronic programming; according to some students, learning how to program microprocessors gave them a sense of empowerment, excitements, and interests in learning more. We also had amazing speakers joining us to speak to our students. Anca Pop from Striker Advisory talked about Cyber Security and the need of female in this area. Nanette Brooks from Lean Solutions Services spoke about STEM careers and how to score in STEM highlighting another meaning of the Entrepreneur in STEM. A special “Thank You” goes to Emilie Francis from Plow Group for her time and effort to help pulling this event together.

Here's what some of the participants had to say:

" On Thursday 03.08.2018, and Friday 03.09.2018, during Teen Tech Week, there was a life changing event at Apollo Middle School. Each day, 50 young ladies gathered in my Robotics Class and had the distinct pleasure of being taught microprocessors under the direction of Mrs. Joumana Rahime from WiTT (Women in Technology). It was absolutely amazing. To see all the excitement, and success of the young ladies was extraordinary. The News Crew at Apollo came and videotaped the event, did interviews, and showed the event to the entire school. The response was huge! Now even more girls are interested in learning microprocessors. We were awarded four microprocessors by Mrs. Rahime!!! We are asking for help to get a total of 32 Lilypad Arduino microprocessors, so we can teach a class of 32 girls. I can't wait to organize another event with WiTT. Thank you for the opportunity to help so many young ladies see that they have the skills and determination needed to be successful in Engineering and Technology.” 

- Yvette Tolliver, STEM+Arts+Robotics Instructor, Apollo Middle Prep

“I loved the session; my favorite part was being able to create things.”

- Hoda, Overton High School

“What we learned today was very cool! I now know how web coding works and learn a lot about coding.” 

- Sobirjon, Oliver Middle School

“My favorite part was to program the LED lights to turn on and off in a pattern.” 

- Kiyah, Apollo Middle School

“It was really good to learn about all the different STEM careers and the salaries.” 

- Alexander, Antioch High School