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TEC Camp Inspires Future Female Engineers

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Making physics and aeronautics concepts as interesting as the “Hunger Games” trilogy or the latest smartphone app is one of the challenges that Hernando Jimenez enjoys most about working with Georgia Tech’s TEC Camp.       

“It can be intimidating,” said Jimenez, a research engineer in the School of Aerospace Engineering, who has been an instructor for the camp since 2008. “But it’s very rewarding to observe campers having fun and becoming genuinely intrigued about the different concepts they are learning while putting them into practice. It is also rewarding to see them realize that engineering is not beyond them and that they can in fact be quite successful at it.”

The camp was created in 2001 by the Women in Engineering program at Tech to provide middle school-aged girls with an opportunity to come to campus for a week and engage in hands-on engineering and computing activities.

This year’s camp welcomed 40 rising seventh and eighth graders. The girls were split into teams of 10, with each team being guided throughout the week by two junior counselors (high school-aged girls who are program alumnae) and senior counselors (female engineering students at Tech).

Each day, the girls took part in hands-on classes focusing on topics such as aerospace engineering, chemical engineering, web design, acoustics, transportation engineering and presentation skills. The camp classes are taught by Tech professors, graduate students and women from the community who work in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields.  

In addition to the classes, fun activities such as a luncheon with an undergraduate student panel, a picnic and outdoor games and a celebration dinner at the end of the week, which parents are invited to, are also sprinkled into the schedule each year.

“The girls really seem to enjoy the variety of hands-on, interactive activities they participate in,” said Ann Blasick, associate director of Women in Engineering. “Of course, they also enjoy getting to know the engineering students and faculty, as well as one another.”

This was the first year Juandalyn Richards, a school technology specialist for Fulton County Schools, sent her daughter, 13-year-old Zharia, to the camp.

“She’s already told me that she wants to be a biomedical engineer,” Richards said. “This camp allows our young daughters the opportunity to gain exposure to engineering and the many opportunities that exist for women.”  

Registration for the 2013 camp will open in February and can be completed at www.coe.gatech.edu/wie. The cost to attend the camp is $250.

For more information, contact Blasick.

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  • Workflow Status:Published
  • Created By:Amelia Pavlik
  • Created:07/02/2012
  • Modified By:Fletcher Moore
  • Modified:10/07/2016