Geek Gurl Diaries: Inspiring the Next Generation of Women in Tech

Hi all! I hope you will join us, whether you are a teacher or a student for an interesting session with myself, Kim Wilkens and Catherine Cronin, on how we are inspiring the next generation of girls to take up tech.

Your Name and Title: Carrie Anne Philbin

School, Library, or Organization Name: Robert Clack School

Co-Presenter Name(s): Catherine Cronin, Kim Wilkens

Country from Which You Will Present: UK, Ireland, USA

Language in Which You Will Present: English

Target Audience (such as primary school teachers, high school administrators, students, etc.): Primary and secondary school teachers and students.

Short Session Description (one line): Geek Gurl Diaries: Inspiring the Next Generation of Women in Tech

Full Session Description (one paragraph minimum):
Carrie Anne Philbin, Kim Wilkens and Catherine Cronin are promoting global awareness of an issue that the United Nations is also highlighting with it's own day on October 11, the first ever International Day of the Girl. In this session they will share their experiences and best practices in promoting science, engineering, and computer studies to teenage girls and beyond. Our efforts are all focused on building connections through social media with schools, universities organizations, companies, women's groups as well as individual women and girls.

The U.N. recognizes that the empowerment and investment in girls is critical for economic growth and eradication of poverty. As technology educators from different countries, we daily experience the underrepresentation of girls in technology education while also recognizing that one very important way to empower girls to imagine and achieve new futures is by providing them with solid foundational knowledge of computer science concepts and inspiring them to share their vision with the globally connected community.

Computing shapes how people interact with each other around the world while enabling innovation and economic growth. It is a vital global competency that too many of our young people are not being exposed to in school.

The Geek Gurl Diaries, a collection of video logs, interviews with women working in computer science, engineering, technology and science, discussions with geek girls on geek culture topics, and ‘how to’ tutorial videos was created by Carrie Anne Philbin, a secondary ICT teacher in East London. It was created after she noticed that the uptake of these subjects by teenage girls in higher education was limited, and that female students would opt for more creative and academic subjects like Art, Dance or Humanities. She wanted to develop a network of individuals who could inspire a new generation to take up more traditionally geeky subjects. The theory being that if students could see how creative some careers are that they would be more inspired.

Carrie Anne Philbin is one of many women in technology education worldwide working to bridge the gender gap in the STEM fields. A few others will be joining Carrie Anne in this session to share their stories. Kim Wilkens is the founder of Teen Tech Girls and is working to establish Day of the Tech Girl to coincide with the International Day of the Girl on October 11. Catherine Cronin is a lecturer in IT at the National University of Ireland. She is working to address the issue of the lack of female keynote speakers at educational technology and IT conferences as well as the gender gap in the study of STEM fields in Ireland.

Websites / URLs Associated with Your Session:

Lucy,
As a GEC Advisory Board member, I encouraged Carrie Anne to submit a proposal because I thought the subject was a good fit for the conference. Maybe the proposal is too focused on what we are doing and not on describing how it is raising awareness of a global issue and why we are focused on this grassroots, global, social media-infused outlet as one way to address the issue. Here's how I think this session fits the overall conference key mission points:

promote global awareness - We are promoting global awareness of an issue that the United Nations is also highlighting with it's own day on October 11, the first ever International Day of the Girl. The U.N. recognizes that the empowerment and investment in girls is critical for economic growth and eradication of poverty. As technology educators from different countries, we daily experience the underrepresentation of girls in technology education while also recognizing that one very important way to empower girls to imagine and achieve new futures is by providing them with solid foundational knowledge of computer science concepts and inspiring them to share their vision with the globally connected community.
foster global competency - In the words of Douglas Rushkoff, we need to "program or be programmed" Computing is a global competency.
inspire action towards solving real-world problems - Our efforts are all focused on building connections through social media with schools, universities organizations, companies, women's groups as well as individual women and girls.

Would adding this type of background info help?

Thanks,

Kim

Replies

Kim Wilkens November 13, 2012 at 4:43pm

Session is November 15 at 2pm EST. Join @ https://sas.elluminate.com/d.jnlp?sid=2008350&password=GECPart196
Catherine Cronin November 12, 2012 at 6:16am

This session is scheduled for Thursday, 15th November, 7:00 pm GMT. We will post the link to the session here as soon as it becomes available. Looking forward to it!
Co-Chair

Lucy Gray September 17, 2012 at 7:54am

Hi -

It's not clear how this proposal relates to our mission: http://www.globaleducationconference.com/notes/The_GEC_Mission_Stat.... Remember, we are not an iCT conference!

Please edit and add language that makes the global connections aspect of your work more apparent!

Thanks,

Lucy Gray
- Kim Wilkens > Lucy Gray September 17, 2012 at 12:22pm
  Lucy,
  As a GEC Advisory Board member, I encouraged Carrie Anne to submit a proposal because I thought the subject was a good fit for the conference. Maybe the proposal is too focused on what we are doing and not on describing how it is raising awareness of a global issue and why we are focused on this grassroots, global, social media-infused outlet as one way to address the issue. Here's how I think this session fits the overall conference key mission points:
  
  promote global awareness - We are promoting global awareness of an issue that the United Nations is also highlighting with it's own day on October 11, the first ever International Day of the Girl. The U.N. recognizes that the empowerment and investment in girls is critical for economic growth and eradication of poverty. As technology educators from different countries, we daily experience the underrepresentation of girls in technology education while also recognizing that one very important way to empower girls to imagine and achieve new futures is by providing them with solid foundational knowledge of computer science concepts and inspiring them to share their vision with the globally connected community.
  
  foster global competency - In the words of Douglas Rushkoff, we need to "program or be programmed" Computing is a global competency.
  
  inspire action towards solving real-world problems - Our efforts are all focused on building connections through social media with schools, universities organizations, companies, women's groups as well as individual women and girls.
  
  Would adding this type of background info help?
  
  Thanks,
  
  Kim
  - Co-Chair
    
    Lucy Gray > Kim Wilkens September 17, 2012 at 1:22pm
    
    Kim -
    
    It is common for many submissions to miss including language that supports the goal of the conference. This does not mean that the topic is not relevant; it means that the proposer needs to be mindful of our mission statement and needs to elaborate further so it is clear how this relates to the mission. While the proposal gives a lot of information about Carrie's goals and all of your backgrounds, it is not clear how this project itself is connecting classrooms in the description. I think it would be great for you to incorporate the bullet points you've listed above into the proposal. Feel free to revise, and let me know when you are ready to have this reviewed again.
    
    For more information on what we mean by global competence, please check out this article:
    
    http://asiasociety.org/education/partnership-global-learning/making...
    
    Thanks!
    - Carrie Anne Philbin > Lucy Gray September 26, 2012 at 7:05am
      
      I have updated the proposal above. I hope this is more appropriate.

This reply was deleted.