Discussion on All-Girl events

[Sperkowsky]

Originally Posted by smitikshah

Yes - thanks Mark. That's what I was supposed to write.

And I do agree with your second statement. While this event has its place, another opportunity could be to figure out a way to promote integration of females directly in male dominated environments.

IMHO an event like this would be a lot better if instead of an all women drive team they did a 50/50 drive team. I also think if the end goal is to promote women in Engineering then promoting females in the pits is a good tactic.

A concern no one seems to have brought up yet is the fact that some small teams like ours don't have enough active females to field a drive team. For 10-25 person teams this could very well be the case.

Although I can't give my full opinions on this topic I will end with this. The engineering world is primarily male and will most likely be like this for at least our generation. First is about learning. Whether we like it or not a valid skill for females to learn if they want to pursue engineering is working with primarily men. I also feel an event like this may broadcast a wrong message to females. A message that the only way for them to gain an important positions is to get rid of all the males. That's the exact opposite direction we should be going in.

Lastly I had the convenience of being able to select my Co captain this year. Smiti at the time was not near the most dedicated member nor knew the most about Frc but what I saw was a competent person who would be the best at leading the team. Gender never played a factor and imo if shouldn't. The most competent person should be chosen and I believe was chosen.