STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math education.
While visiting Google in October I had the pleasure of attending a Q&A with Sascha Paladino Creator and Executive Producer of Miles from Tomorrowland, Dr. Yvonne Cagle, NASA Astronaut & Consultant on Miles from Tomorrowland, Angela Navarro Software Engineer for Google, Diane Ikemiyashiro, Director of Original Programming, Disney Junior and Isis Anchalee, Software Engineer behind the #ILookLikeanEngineer movement. The moderator was Julie Ann Crommett CS Education in Media Program Manager, Google. All heavy hitters in the STEM field.
Creator Sascha Paladino created Miles from Tomorrowland with a male focus but quickly learned that Miles’s sister Loretta was a star in her own right and that little girls were going crazy over her. This was amazing to see since statistically, girls were not one to pursue STEM careers and they wondered why that was.
Only 18% of computer scientists are female, mainly because girls were not encouraged, or even knew that STEM careers were possible. That was the issue, girls didn’t know that they could enter into these professions without adult encouragement. That is why it is so very important today to guide young girls who show an interest in STEM careers, without out that guidance they may not feel confident pursuing them.
How can we get girls to be more interested in STEM curriculums? Introduce them to new things, inspire them and aspire to be more. Just like Isis Anchalee, she started out as an 8-year-old child who taught herself to code by clicking on and viewing the source and creating websites. She was interested in coding and took to it easily but no one to pushed her to learn more or gave her the go ahead that it was okay to go into the field so she decided to go into pre-med. It was years later that she realized that she could in fact be a coder and excel in the field.
A picture of her ended up shocking people and made them think she couldn’t be a coder because she was girl, a beautiful young girl. This lead to people saying that she “didn’t look like a software engineer”. That picture went viral and #Ilooklikeanegineer became a very real thing. That hashtag was tweeted over 170 thousand times and became a way to celebrate women engineers. She proved that you don’t have to “look” a certain way to be a coder, or in the field that is predominately a men’s field.
Science and technology is in every aspect of our lives, it is up to everyone to lead not only girls, but all children to wanting to learn more and to pursue those careers.
Curiosity is key
Take a look at this Miles from Tomorrowland STEM Featurette featuring Sascha Paladino (Creator & Executive Producer), Sue Perrotto (Director), Olivia Munn (Voice of Phoebe Callisto), Rachel Blum (Google Engineer) and Dr. Yvonne Cagle (Mission Specialist, NASA).
An upcoming episode of Miles from Tomorrowland “The Discovery Expedition” will be airing soon (10:30 AM ET/PT) – Loretta uses her coding skills to discover a hidden planet. In this episode, you will see something that is not represented in the mainstream media as much as it should be – girls coding. Miles from Tomorrowland is not only tackling that issue but showcasing girls in STEM fields including coding/computer science.
Disclosure: I was provided with an all-expense trip to San Francisco by Walt Disney Studios to attend various events. All opinions are 100% my own.
Dianna Ranere