On June 29th, 2019, Philadelphia SWE held a joint outreach event with Drexel University SWE titled “Transition to College with Confidence.” Young women from grade 9 through incoming college freshman traveled to Pennoni’s Headquarters in Center City, Philadelphia for this day-long event. After an introduction from Dani Schroeder (Philadelphia VP of Outreach) and a “What is SWE?” Presentation from Maria Legato (Philadelphia SWE section president), attendees split for two separate programs: a student program and a parent educational program.
In the morning as part of the student program, tips for student success—like finding a study group—were discussed. Afterwards, the students were guided through a hands-on activity where they extracted DNA from strawberries! For the separate parent educational program, parents learned why engineering is a good career choice and how to encourage their daughter if they want to pursue a STEM career. The last event of the day brought the students and parents back together for a college panel featuring current college students studying a variety of engineering majors from both Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania. There was great dialogue throughout the day between all attendees! Philadelphia SWE will hopefully continue this event again in 2020.
We are pleased and honored that this STEM outreach event has been awarded a SWE WE Local 2020 Joint Professional/Collegiate Event Award! The event was made possible by a Program Development Grant with the Society of Women Engineers through a generous donation from the ExxonMobil Foundation. Special thanks to all our SWE volunteers who run and organize the event: Dani Schroeder (Former Philadelphia SWE VP of Outreach), Maria Legato (Philadelphia SWE President), Maissoun Ksara (Philadelphia SWE VP of Outreach), Danielle Dunn, Nikita Patel, Grace Contino, Dannelly Beck, Jessi Brown, Jennifer Ligo, Olivia Unger, Jillian Saunders, Ashley Bishop, Kristine Loh, Kerianne Chen, Khadija Koita, Marlena Farber, Celine Khoo, and Amanda Lugo.
