When I was little, Wizard of Oz was one of my favorite movies and by far the one that I watched the most. Though I’m a little disappointed in myself that I had that classic movie quote wrong in my head for so long but Google says that’s common so I must be in good company. It’s such a magical moment in that movie when Dorothy takes her first step from the black and white world of Kansas into the beautiful, colorful Land of Oz. It’s such a dramatic change and rather amazing to a little viewer.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately on dramatic changes like this. This past weekend, my husband and I went to see my 103 year old grandmother and introduce her to our 8 month old son. It was a beautiful moment to see her reach out and hold his hand for a while and great to bring her some joy in what little time she has left. And can we just take a minute to think about this: 103 years old! How the world has changed in that time and how dramatically for women, including women in STEM.
My Grandma Polly at 102 with the baby blanket that she made for my son
My grandmother was born on January 3rd, 1913. She lived through both World Wars, the Great Depression, the moon landing, and too many technological innovations to count. Her last phone was a cell phone which would have been an absurd concept when she was a child. For women, the path was quite limited when she grew up. Women didn’t even have the right to vote until she was 6 years old. My grandmother was only allowed an eight grade education as she was pulled from school to help raise her younger siblings. She was the oldest child and the only girl with seven younger brothers. Good grief, that’s a lot of testosterone!
As a counter, my grandmother ended up having three girls. Things were a little different in the world when my mother was born though some viewpoints hadn’t changed too much. My grandfather refused to allow my mom to go to law school because why would you pay for law school when you’ll end up married and home with kids. I was quite shocked when she first told me that story. This didn’t quite mesh with my Type A, “I can do anything” mom. As a result, she stayed in town and got a music degree, playing in the typically male dominant percussion section no less. She ended up going in teaching, specifically English (hopefully my grammar is correct in this blog post!) and later into district level roles around career education.
Though it seems a surprise that I ended up being the only engineer in my entire family and extended family, looking back it probably shouldn’t have been that surprising. With my mom being focused on career education, she was very aware of the variety of roles and opportunities out there. Since I was good at math and science, of course she was going to help me find possibilities in that arena. Add in a fantastic high school chemistry teacher plus an awesome and incredibly patient pre-calculus and AP calculus teacher (I missed a lot of class due to golf and she was always willing to help me get caught up), chemical engineering was not that far away.
Many of the studies out there show that girls get involved in STEM careers because someone along the way pointed out that option to them. Often that role model in their life directed them a STEM role that the girl didn’t even know existed such as engineering for me. There are lots of options out there for both men and women to get involved and teach kids about the wide variety of STEM careers out there. One of my personal favorites is the program for Women in Science and Engineering at Iowa State University. I’ve been a longtime advisory board member for the program which reaches 9000 K-12 students ever year. They also do a tremendous amount of undergraduate support and these students that I meet through their events always amaze me. If you’re not already doing so, I encourage you to get involved in outreach or mentoring and help bring someone into a Technicolor world of the career possibilities out there, especially those in STEM.
Someday soon, I know that my grandmother will be traveling somewhere over the rainbow and she’ll be at peace. The world changed a lot while she was here and I hope that we will continue to see positive change related to women during my lifetime.
Great blog! Thanks for sharing. I can relate to the "someone pointing out the option" as I had a math teacher that encouraged me to go into engineering (and a Dad who is an engineer at heart though not by degree).
Some common threads....the role of a great teacher, supportive parents, and believing that you really can do anything. Great blog; thanks!!