Research says: Feminine STEM role models do not motivate girls

[Jessica Boucher]

Originally Posted by Katie_UPS

After reading all of this though, I now wonder what effect I have on younger girls that I see/mentor. As someone who would like to be a positive role model, I wonder if I am having a positive effect. Am I too girly? Not girly enough? Am I giving girls in engineering a bad name?

Woah, woah, woah. Don't drive yourself nuts here. Your students will choose who they look up to, not the other way around. Just be yourself, be honest, and most importantly, be present. The best role models are the ones you can relate to.

[Jon Stratis]

Working with an all girls team, I know the team feels like they should be role models to younger girls and girls on other teams. We do that a few ways. The students strive to be the best engineers they can be, the entire team strives to maintain a positive outlook and high, productive energy levels. Lastly, the students are honest with other girls about what its like being on the team.

As a role model, all you can do is be yourself. If you try to impress too hard, you'll end up turning people off. We all know sports figures who tried really hard to get their names in the press and stay "popular". The other side of that are the sports figures who try their best in the game and have natural talent that everyone looks up to. They give credit to their team, and don't try overly hard to impress in front of the press. Which do you look up to more?

Regardless of your own personal style, students will be inspired just by working with you and being supported by you and other mentors in the program. Remember, it's not our job to tell them the "one and only" way to be an engineer. It's our job to get them interested and excited about engineering. They'll figure out their own style as they go.

[MamaSpoldi]

Originally Posted by Jessica Boucher

Woah, woah, woah. Don't drive yourself nuts here. Your students will choose who they look up to, not the other way around. Just be yourself, be honest, and most importantly, be present. The best role models are the ones you can relate to.

Jess - I could not have said it better myself. I will admit that I too wonder sometimes if I am the "best" role model for the young women on our team... and I try to remind myself, each time I hear this question whispered in my mind, that I can only do my best... just like every other mentor. My answer is to try to relate to what they are looking for, sharing my experience, and helping them achieve their goals in whatever way I can.

Originally Posted by Astrokid248

My point is that the people who make these motivational posters and videos need to be balanced in how they portray female STEM role models. For every video of how science makes your makeup, there needs to be a Rosy the Riveter out-muscling linebackers with a wrench or Sam Carter fixing old motorcycles after coming home from a hard day of interdimensional wormhole physics. And more to the original point of this thread, realism is the key here. The video from the original article? Faker than all the noses in Hollywood combined. That will turn most girls off simply because of how silly it all is.

I totally agree with this point as well... and I have seen it way too many times, oddly enough, from the Girl Scouts as well. Almost every science program they offer somehow relates STEM to makeup or some other very girly topic, totally alienating the girls who are actually interested in STEM in the first place. This has been a point of frustration expressed to me by many young women who have given up on scouts because of that lack of substance in their program.

[GeeTwo]

My apologies in necro'ing a thread, but a spotlight post spoke to me, and I followed it, and I read, and I am called to post...

Inspiration can come from any angle - the key is to be there to fan it to a flame when the spark lands.

3946 currently has no female technical mentors (Wendy has a science degree, but her main role is with safety contracts, ordering shirts, and organizing transportation and lodging.) Despite this, we have consistently had about a 2:3 mix of girls and boys on the team right from year one.

Case studies: Victorija: I don't know how she was recruited, but she was one of our best mechanical students in 2013. She's now majoring in ME at LA Tech, her younger brother is on the team (heap big fundraiser last year as a freshman), and her mother drove me up to St. Louis last year. I've never seen nor met her father. She came to the team knowing what she wanted to do, and learned a good bit from us.

Robin: A great team member the last three years, and our most accomplished student solderer to date. Even though she decided that she needed to take a job this year rather than sticking with the team, she supported us through tryouts this fall to teach soldering. I have no idea whether her career will be in STEM, but I know I'm not the only mentor who will provide her with an excellent reference whatever she decides to do with her life. (OBTW, she was one of only two human players I know of who threw litter over an FRC defensive net in 2015, both at Bayou Semifinals match #2.)

Veronica: In the interest of full disclosure, my daughter. I was a bit surprised when she joined the team, as VJ has no interest in a STEM career (she's intending to become a signer for the deaf). She grew up in my home, and though she tried to deny geekhood, it was in the blood. (Though it didn't work out, her mother and I met at a science fiction convention.) When we earned a trip to St. Louis, her sales ability (from her mother or perhaps my brother, not me), raised her to second on the team (just behind Leevi, Victorija's brother).

MaryEllen: Wow! This is her sophomore year, but she's already shown me more capability than some of our graduates. I don't know what we did to deserve her, or to recruit her, but I fully expect her to be a success in whatever she decides to pursue. With two Mary Ellens per year, an eight-student team would probably be dominant at just about any regional. I don't know what inspired her, or what keeps her, but I'm hoping for a repeat.