In November 2019, the 2019-2020 EngineerGirl Ambassadors touched down in Anaheim, CA for the world’s largest conference for women engineers and their first in-person meeting as Ambassadors. The 16 new Ambassadors and their sponsors attended the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) annual conference November 6-9, 2019 to network with professional engineers, cultivate their leadership skills, and gather resources and feedback for their projects.

Applications for the 2019 EngineerGirl Ambassador program and the number of Ambassadors selected more than doubled since the first year of the program. The 16 Ambassadors were selected from around the country based on their project ideas and enthusiasm for engaging the next generation of women engineers.

The Ambassadors first met on Wednesday, November 5, for an impromptu dinner meet and greet to kick off the Ambassador conference schedule of events. Dinner was followed by the conference Ice Cream Social where the Ambassadors enjoyed ice cream, music, and the chance to socialize with thousands of professional and collegiate engineers attending SWE. Feelings of excitement and anticipation for the inspiring and engaging weekend of events were shared by all!

Thursday morning began with an impassioned message of perseverance and resilience from the opening keynote presentation by Carol Malnati. Carol shared inspiring stories from her experiences with changing the status quo in a male-dominated field as both a collegiate engineer and now Vice President CRHF R&D of Medtronic.

Feeling empowered and capable after hearing Carol’s keynote, the Ambassadors spent the rest of the day in training sessions with Angel Nash from Techbridge Girls. During the sessions, the Ambassadors discussed and brainstormed strategies for creating an inclusive and culturally-responsive environment in their programs. They also learned tools and techniques for effective questioning to better engage their participants.

For lunch, the Ambassadors were paired one-on-one with industry mentors to work on developing and troubleshooting their community projects. Vanessa Hill, award-winning STEM educator and advocate, met with the Ambassadors to share expert tips for video, online, and other media components of their projects. After lunch, the Ambassadors got to put their TechBridge training to the test when they taught their sponsors and Vanessa Hill how to build paper rockets. The workshop ended with an inspirational video from 2018 EngineerGirl Ambassador, Alyssa Ho, on the challenges and successes of developing her EngineerGirl project. Later on, the Ambassadors joined the SWENext High School Leadership academy for a catered dinner to connect with other like-minded high school students and professionals.

On Friday, the Ambassadors participated in the SWENext High School Leadership Academy programming. A major highlight of the day was exploring the SWE Career Fair with collegiate SWE members. The Ambassadors talked with industry representatives and snagged lots of swag!

Saturday was the Invent It Build It Outreach Expo for middle school students in the region and another opportunity for the Ambassadors to use their skills. Hundreds of young girls from around Anaheim came to participate in hands-on engineering activities and learn about opportunities to continue exploring engineering. This year, the Ambassadors planned and ran a paper rockets activity – complete with a target for students to aim for – to teach students the basics of aerodynamics. The activity was a hit! The booth was always crowded with eager students and the Ambassadors were excellent instructors. The students especially enjoyed creating something they could take home with them from the Expo. Working the paper rocket booth in shifts, the Ambassadors and their sponsors also had the opportunity to explore the Expo and pick up inspiration for their own programs.

After lunch, the Ambassadors met to develop evaluation tools for the programs to help them gauge their program success. After our final debrief, the Ambassadors headed home full of excitement and resources for their community projects. Keep an eye on the individual Ambassador pages for updates on their projects!