Thread: Girls on Teams
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Unread 04-02-2008, 11:33
ManicMechanic ManicMechanic is offline
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AKA: Yolande
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Re: Girls on Teams

We have 6 guys and 1 gal on our (FTC) team. The gal is the head programmer and a builder. The 2 mentors are male and female (myself). He takes care of food, room, and school administration, and I handle the robotic aspects and FIRST administration.

I have noticed some frustration about the treatment of women in engineering in this thread. Having been immersed in STEM (sci/tech/engineering/math) since HS/college in the late '70s and early 80's (ouch, that's 30+ years!), I wanted to offer my perspective and encouragement to younger women.

No doubt, life in STEM is not always easy for women, and I have experienced prejudice and disrespect in some predominantly male school and work environments. But alongside that, I have found other men who were encouraging, and some who bent over backwards to assist me because I was a woman. It's your choice to focus on the voices that bring you down or the ones that bring you up. If you need help, ask for it. In the rare situation when there are no encouraging voices, I have always found that a job well done is the most effective way to silence the scoffers -- good work speaks for itself.

One important aspect of gaining respect is knowing yourself and being realistic about your strengths and weaknesses. There are some girls who think they are being dissed for being girls, when the reality is that sometimes, they not respected because they think they are better than they are. As an EE major, I spent 60-80 hours/week to get mostly C's in EE classes, with only my math classes salvaging my GPA. I came to the realization that at best I could only be a mediocre engineer and instead went to graduate school in math, which I now teach at a junior college. There are women who are truly gifted engineers, but I'm not one of them. If you are a gifted engineer, you go girl! But if your gift is technical writing, don't let others tell you, "Girls shouldn't get stuck doing the journal." That kind of talk pushed me into an engineering degree that was unsuitable, and I had to go back to grad school to rectify it.

Women sometimes get opportunities that they wouldn’t have if they were men. When I was a senior, I receive unsolicited invitations to interview, even though I had a 3.2 GPA, while male classmates with 3.8 GPAs and more work experience were unable to beg interviews with the same companies. More currently, I know of a college that offers 2 engineering scholarships: anyone can apply for the first scholarship but only women or underrepresented minorities can apply for the second. Women get 2 shots at a full ride, while Asian/Caucasian males only get one, with a lot less competition for the second spot. It's not as easy for talented white males to get noticed, and we do them and ourselves a disservice when we gripe about the plight of women without acknowledging their challenges as well.

Should we make use of this "unfair advantage?" As compensation for the disadvantages that sometimes come with being a woman, I feel that making judicious use of any opportunity that comes your way is fair game. Perhaps because of my gender, I have an interesting track record with interviews: I have received a job offer for every job that I've interviewed for (except for fast food jobs I was turned down for while a student). But to avoid taking advantage of the situation, I have chosen never to interview for a job unless I am genuinely interested in the position, and once hired, I aim to do the job in such a way that my employer has no regrets. This includes refusing to take a job for which I know I'm not qualified.

Life is not fair (if it were, I would take my turn at being one of the world's 3 million hungry), but it doesn't have to be fair to be good. If you find your calling and the right niche in this world, you are blessed indeed, no matter how "high" or "low" you are in relation to others.
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