Delece Smith-Barrow of U.S. News & World Report, recently wrote about the importance of engaging women and minorities in STEM fields. Smith-Barrow interviewed UMBC’s Penny Rheingans, director for the Center of Women in Technology (CWIT).

Smith Barrow wrote: “If students struggle in class and have few peers and faculty that look like them, it’s easy for them to think, “maybe I’m not supposed to be here, either,” says Penny Rheingans, director for the Center for Women in Technology at the University of Maryland—Baltimore County.

Prospective college students who are women or underrepresented minorities can determine if a school can help them in their STEM endeavors by finding out what resources colleges offer these kinds of students.

The Center for Women in Technology at UMBC​ provides mentoring services, ​seminars that discuss topics such as networking and time management and a number of other resources, Rheingans says. A living and learning residence community provided through the program caters to women and men in STEM, but the former group dominates.

“Eighty-five percent of students who live on our floor are women,” she says.

Rheingan encourages prospective students to keep an eye out for school environments that have structures in place that support women. “You’re looking for a community,” she says. Visiting the college and talking to current students is one way to find out about the community, she says.”

During the past school year, several UMBC students traveled to Nashville, Tennessee to partake in the first-ever Women in Cybersecurity Conference.

Thanks to our wonderful donors, Emily Scheerer ’14, computer science; Christina Malliakos ’14, computer science; Emily McMurray ’14, computer science; and Ruth Coradin ’16, computer science and applied linguistics, were able to receive supplementary funding for their trip out west. The money was raised through a crowd-funded project undertaken by the Center for Women in Technology (CWIT). When the need for additional funding arose, CWIT reached out to its alumni and friends and rallied community support to ensure that the students would be able to attend the conference.

At workshops on subjects such as cryptography and technical industry, the Retrievers were able to network both themselves and their skills to others in the computer science industry. “I think it is great to be in a place where everyone has the same types of goals as you. The focus of the conference was so specific, it was great to know that other students are going through the same experiences as me, and the professionals have made it through the journey that I am on my professional career,” said Malliakos about her experience at the Women in Cybersecurity Conference. Guests included Emily Shen of the MIT Lincoln Lab and the director of NSA’s training division.

Although the conference was only two days, the experience has had a lasting impact on Scheerer, Malliakos, and Coradin. “I am truly thankful for the opportunity to be a part of such a rewarding experience. I have stayed in touch with both mentors and peers that I met at the conference,” says Coradin.

Thanks again to all of our donors involved in this endeavor!

Learn more about our other student projects here!

Last week the Center for Women in Information Technology (CWIT) held their second annual “Spring into Leadership,” event.

The event which is designed to provide networking opportunities to women majoring in engineering or information technology had 120 registrants up 23 registrants from last year. Registrants included students as well as 25 Industry professionals from Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Harris Corporation, NSA, BAE Systems, UserWorks, JHU/APL, CyberPoint International, General Electric’s Middle River Aircraft Systems, and AAI.

Wendy Martin, a vice president at Harris Corporation, gave the keynote address focusing on her story and the importance of diversity for organizational success. “The fact that you are different from your peers should not be something you shy away from or something that  you shield from others. It’s a gift, especially in the workplace,” she emphasized to the women majoring in engineering and IT at the event.

Following the keynote the participants were split into networking pairs and then groups.
“By all accounts the event this year was a tremendous success because of the teamwork of the student planning committee,” says Susan Martin, Associate Director of CWIT. “This event really contributes to the sense of community among women in the College of Engineering and Information Technology.”

Spring into Leadership was made possible with support from Lockheed Martin Corporation, the 2011-2012 sponsor of the CWIT Affiliates Program, the UMBC Student Government Association, and the UMBC Graduate Student Association. The program was implemented by student leaders from the CWIT Student Council, the Information Systems Council of Majors (ISCOM) the student chapters of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and the Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) graduate student organization.