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The Pomfret Community School eighth grade girls attended the Multiply Your Options Conference. Photo courtesy of Mrs. Pierce-Fortin.
Attend STEM
POMFRET — The PCS eighth grade girls attended the 27th annual Multiply Your Options Conference. They were among a group of around 250 middle school girls that visited UConn for a conference that introduces them to engineering concepts and careers.
The conference brings together girls with an interest in science, technology, engineering and math with women who can help them accomplish their goals. The eighth-graders work side-by-side with female undergraduate engineering students and accomplished female engineers. The girls take part in a number of fun activities designed to encourage them to consider STEM careers and think scientifically, such as making a robotic hand out of straw.
There’s also a portion where they guess the career of young professional women based on the tools they work with.
Multiply Your Options is part of a larger initiative at UConn School of Engineering to increase the involvement of women in STEM fields. The Engineering Alumni Office has sponsored four annual Women in Engineering events, and many of the undergraduates who participate in Multiply Your Options come from UConn’s Society of Women Engineers chapter. Many of the Society members who participate as undergraduates come back as young professionals.” According to Sally Reis, UConn vice provost for academic affairs, “UConn has the fastest growing percentage of women in engineering of any public engineering school in the country.”
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