One of my passions, lately, has been to find ways to encourage more girls to explore the S.T.E.M. fields. Toward that end, I recently posted some Engineering Resources for Girls. I almost included another link in that post, but decided it would fit better into a post on Technology rather than Engineering – though the two fields obviously overlap quite a bit.
The link I wanted to include is from Mental Floss. It’s called, “Inspiring Quotes from 10 Influential Women in Tech“. One of the surprises in this list was the quote from Hedy Lamarr, an actress who apparently was also a brilliant inventor. “Any girl can be glamorous. All she has to do is stand still and look stupid,” said Ms. Lamarr, co-developer of a technology that was eventually used to guide torpedoes in the U.S. Navy.
What I didn’t notice the first time I read this on-line article was that there was a video at the bottom from IBM’s “Technologista Series”. When I finally ran across it, I thought it was an ad. I looked up the YouTube description, and found this, “Women have been part of some of the most important innovations throughout IBM’s history. The Technologista Series celebrates these accomplishments by showcasing 10 technical women at IBM today. Follow the series to gain valuable insights about the unique culture of IBM as well as a chance to see the faces behind the innovations that have changed our world.”
What keeps this set of videos from being an overt IBM ad campaign are the topics and the young girls (3rd, 4th, and 5th graders) who interview the “Technologistas” in each segment. In addition to the introductory video, there are 14 short (a little over a minute long) videos – ranging from discussions of innovation to cyber security. The women emphasize many important character traits, such as leadership and creativity, and are great role models in the technology industry for young women to hear and view.
