Being Geek Chic is a blog about one woman navigating the male-dominated industries of production and tech. It's written by Elizabeth Giorgi, Founder, CEO and Director of Mighteor - one of the world's first internet video production companies. Learn more about Mighteor here.
When I decided to start my company, I had already spent a lot of time on the traditional path. I had been working in different parts of media, marketing and communications for 8 years before the glimmer of entrepreneurship even caught my eye and I can still remember thinking: “Really? Me?” So imagine being four years into your college experience and already knowing that the path we’re sold and told to follow isn’t for you. That’s what happened to Erin Winik, Founder and CEO of Sci Chic and our guest blogger for today.
From day one of college as an engineering student, you are told repeatedly to get leadership experience, hands-on practice in engineering, and internships as soon as possible. Get your resume in tip-top shape for recruiters. Network with large engineering firms at career showcase. Get leadership titles. Inundate your resume.
I have always been someone who has striven to please the teachers and people around me, and therefore I dove into my classes and my school’s chapter of the Society of Women Engineers headfirst to work to fill up my resume with exactly what these companies wanted. I worked my way up through the organization and took any opportunity someone would give me.
As I entered my 4th year of college, I was struggling to find the exact company that fit me and my personality. My resume was full to the brim of what everyone else thought I should be, not what I wanted to be. I can now easily get offers for jobs, but they are not the ones I want. I have passions for writing, photography, business, making, sewing, and so much more past the technical experience that I can fit on the front side of one sheet of paper.
At this moment I had a thought, why I am I following this path? Sure, it is the path that college most easily funnels you towards, but forget company name recognition. Forget stable jobs. Forget the normal path. Is this my dream?
Why not make the company for which I am so longing to work?
If the company is not out there, I could be filling a gap both in the market and in my life by creating it. Thomas Edison once said, “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work”. I decided that the work was worth it, and what better time to take a chance than my senior year of college. This led me to creating Sci Chic in October 2015.
The biggest lesson I have learned in college is that you do not have to wait for someone else to deem you worthy to get experience. You can make those situations yourself.
At Sci Chic we used advanced technologies like 3D printing and laser cutting to create customizable science inspired jewelry. I am able to get experience learning about finances, business, manufacturing technologies, marketing, and so many more things that would have taken years for me to get a chance to experience waiting for someone else to give me the opportunity.
However, starting your own company does not come without risks or difficulties, and the difficulties of a senior year of college compounded with this caused some issues. Company deadlines and group project deadlines can often interfere. Needing to study for a midterm can get in the way of the ten emails you really need to send. Add this onto the fact that I am already a minority in mechanical engineering as a woman, and a now a minority as a female entrepreneur/business owner. I somehow seem to always pick the paths where I am a minority, but am happy to do so. I am proud to represent women in an area where we are still so underrepresented.
Strangely though, the thing I have struggled with the most is publicly selling myself as an entrepreneur. Up until starting my own company I have stayed on a traditional college leadership path that didn’t draw any attention for being different. Breaking into entrepreneurship has had to be very public for me since I am trying to draw on many of my college and social media connections to support my business. This makes both my successes and failures within the business very public and open judgement of my choices is not something to which I am accustomed.
But then I hear a story of a little girl wearing our jewelry every day to school. I 3D print a new jewelry design. I go out and meet people who are excited about what we are creating and realize I could not get this experience anywhere but with what I have created and I am grateful for making myself balance classes with this company. I realize that this is where I am meant to be and that all the struggles that come with it are worth it.
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Erin Winick is a 4th year mechanical engineering student at the University of Florida and the founder of Sci Chic. Erin can be found on Twitter @bcofengineering.
Kina McAllister is a scientist (currently at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center—a lab researching gene therapies), entrepreneur, and empowerer. Her mission? Even the playing field for women in STEM careers. Her strategy? Champion girls to discover the engaging and awe-inspiring aspects of STEM in their own way, on their own terms.
McAllister is the creator of StemBox, a monthly subscription science box for girls. Every month, girls receive a box that activates a STEM topic in a unique and hands-on way. Each box contains the necessary equipment and tools for the experiment or activity, as well as a link to corresponding videos featuring explanations from a real female role model working in the field.
Pretty amazing, right? But here’s the thing: McAllister needs some help to make StemBox a full blown reality. Help a fellow lady geek out on Kickstarter, and feel good about your role in empowering girls through STEM.
And read on for our interview with McAllister, which includes a darling story about a 10-year-old girl single-headedly saving the Yucca Mountain…
Q: How did you discover your passion for empowering girls through STEM?
A: I’ve always loved science, probably since I was 5 or 6 when my folks bought me a cool microscope for Christmas. There’s something so satisfying and empowering about tinkering, experimenting, and problem solving to get things done and learn about them. I followed my passion for science throughout my education all the way to college. During that time I had interactions with people who held onto preconceived notions of what a scientist should act and look like and those same people never failed to point out that I was not what they considered a scientist to be since I clearly don’t fit that stereotype they had.
At times I felt so insecure about myself and my career that I didn’t think anyone would take me seriously and that I was just wasting my time. But then I thought back to all the moments in my life where science had brought me so much joy and purpose and I knew I was doing the right thing with my life. The emotional connection to STEM I had created at such a young age and the support I had from those close to me are what kept me in the field and I realized that not all girls have that in their lives.
About two years ago, a
friend who I had relayed this story to invited me to give a 5 minute Ignite
talk which forced me to really focus and narrow down my experiences into a
concise message, which was a huge help in figuring out what I wanted to do to
make my experience something that could help young girls. It was after that
talk that the idea of StemBox was conceived and from there it just felt natural
to continue my message on through this project.
Q: What do you hope to accomplish through StemBox?
A: I would honestly consider this project a success if just one girl who had StemBox growing up found me later in her life and said “Stembox is what made me interested in science, and gave me the courage to stay in the field."
It is so scary being a minority in anything, let alone a woman in STEM where sometimes people don’t even know where your gender’s bathroom is! I want StemBox to give girls a tactile and emotional connection to science. I want girls to get their hands on these experiments, try the protocol if they want, but then go nuts with it and see what other questions they come up with and to test them! These boxes aren’t meant to test girls on their intellectual abilities, though we offer resources to girls wanting to learn more. So many kids have such a negative reaction to STEM in school and tend to avoid it as much as possible. StemBox removes the pressure and gives kids the freedom to play with science and explore. I want those happy and exciting moments of discovery with StemBox to fuel girls to keep going when the going gets tough in their high school chemistry classes, the time they are the only girl in the room, and when they think they don’t belong in STEM because they don’t have any female role models in the field to look up to.
Q: Most gratifying moment thus far as the creator of StemBox?
A: It would probably be the moment the girls in our prototype workshop were at the point in the DNA Extraction protocol where they were precipitating out DNA. It’s that "aha!” moment for them when the can actually see what DNA is and it’s something they’ve done all on their own. The pride and excitement on all of their faces is something I don’t think I’ll ever forget. That moment, is what StemBox is all about.
Q: When did you discover you were “geeky”?
A: The moment my mom hid my petition to keep nuclear waste out of Yucca Mountain from me because I took it with me EVERYWHERE and asked EVERYONE to sign it. I was this 10 year old on a kick to save this mountain and even had a dedicated table at recess to get other 9 and 10 year olds to sign it. Eventually she gave it back when she realized her mistake, but I get it. Haha, I can’t believe she didn’t take it sooner, I would harass complete strangers at my sister’s soccer games about it.
Q: What would you tell your 13-year-old self?
A: On a social note: Don’t worry about the really embarrassing stuff you did in school. They make for REALLY good party stories down the road when you’re an adult.
On an academic note: There is SO much more to science than academia. There are tons of career choices that require creativity and originality. Keep playing around with stuff and exploring your talents!
Emma Bauer is a Being Geek Chic Contributor. Clearly, she’s got great taste. She is a PR enthusiast, dog lover, tea drinker, art appreciator, and of course, aspires to Be Geek Chic. Follow her on Twitter: @emmalynnbauer
I believe in science.
Strictly.
If it could be a religious belief, that would be mine.
So I’m probably not the ideal candidate for a Tarot Card reading. But that’s the funny thing about having your entire life turned upside down. Suddenly, because you don’t have a lot of room to worry about shit, you start thinking that really, who the fuck cares if I keep my mind open to a deck of cards for an hour?
That’s how I ended up getting a tarot card reading from a lovely women named Sterling on a beautiful May morning.
She was warm and kind and struck me as less of a mystic and more of a normal. I don’t know why I was expecting a woman who literally had a flower in her hair, but I was grateful that she was quite like me. Extroverted and funny and rad.
Sure, there was a healthy skeptical guard up, but she had this way of making me feel like trusting her and this whole situation was going to make it a hell of a lot more worth while than closing myself off.
When she left me with the deck of cards for a minute, she told me to look through them. I had never seen tarot cards like these. They were thick and beautifully illustrated. I could have taken one home and framed it, that’s how beautiful they were. They were edged in a metallic silver and felt lovely in your hands. I could actually feel myself assigning them some kind of mystic connection to my soul by the time she came back.
Oh, the power of aesthetics.
She she shuffled them, I found myself thinking two things: what does it matter? Or actually, whose reading would I get if she didn’t? Important distinctions when considering the future. Then she asked me to cut the deck and tell her about where I’m at right now, what answers I’m looking for in my life that brought me to her that day.
Answers. They’re a weird thing. We seek them because we think they will give us closure, but mostly, if you’re really paying attention, you’ll realize that they just beget more questions.
Why did it end?
Because we hurt each other.
Why did we hurt each other?
Because we are imperfect.
Why didn’t we forgive each other?
Because we are stubborn humans.
How do we fix it?
Probably can’t now.
See. It never fucking ends. There are always more questions to ask. Always more answers to desire.
I didn’t want any more answers. I wanted confidence in my gut. I wanted to just feel good again. More than anything: I wanted to feel that my intuition wasn’t totally broken.
As she laid the cards out, I could feel myself getting ridiculously excited about the whole practice of it. I appreciated how she carefully turned each one over and very slowly and delicately placed them on the table, one by one. Her eyes studding the card she placed before it for context and clarity.
When we started talking about the meaning of each card, the careful wall of skepticism that my mind built around my heart was immediately cracked open and knocked over.
“I believe the cards don’t tell us what is in the future or what we should do. I believe the cards are a mirror and if we hold them up to ourselves, we will be able to see ourselves and our lives differently.”
And you know what? She was right. I didn’t learn anything that day that I didn’t already know deep within myself:
“You’ve been tending a lot of seeds in your business, and it has felt like they are growing incredibly slow, but something is about to happen, and it’s about to happen fast. You just have to keep nurturing it.”
“You invested a lot of yourself into something. Something that was taken away from you violently and left you ruined. But you have to make the choice to walk away from it now if you’re going to be happy. There is hope if you can do that.”
It wasn’t an answer. It was a reminder that not everything was lost. A reminder that I had all the answers I needed inside myself. No questions. Just answers. Just ideas. Just an intuition about what is supposed to happen next. I suppose it’s rather vague so you can discover that over and over.
Do I believe the cards were divine? I don’t know.
But I do believe this: I no longer feel the need to ask questions.
With a undergraduate degree in social psychology, a PhD in physics, and experiences in science journalism, radio, podcasting, and the Peace Corps in West Africa, Lady Geek Stephanie Chasteen (@sciencegeekgirl) is transforming the world—one budding mind at a time.
She’s a science education consultant working with high school and college teachers to change the way science is taught in classrooms. As a passionate academic and a STEMinist through and through, Chasteen is helping the minds of up-and-coming physicists bloom. And that’s a pretty cool thing.
So check out Chasteen’s interview with Being Geek Chic, and discover what makes this Lady Geek tick.
Q: How did you discover your passion for educational reform - especially in the sciences?
A: I took a rather circuitous path. The short answer is that I was incredibly inspired by working with creative, smart teachers at a world-class science museum, and I completely changed my life path as a result of that. The longer answer; I got my PhD in Condensed Matter Physics, but I knew that I probably wanted to do something with communication of science to the public, because I had a passion for explaining science rather than doing science. I did a lot of science journalism while I was getting my PhD.
After I got my degree, I was looking around for the Next Step, and I found a postdoctoral fellowship at the Exploratorium Museum of Science. That postdoctoral appointment changed my life. While I did some science communication, I mostly worked with K12 science teachers on how to incorporate hands-on, inquiry-based techniques in the classroom (for example, watching how colored dye mixes with milk, or trying to “float” a piece of plastic using a charged rod). I realized how little my own education had prepared me to be able to explain everyday phenomena, and to really understand the world. I wanted to devote my life to changing how science is taught, to make sure that a sense of wonder is infused in all our science classes. I mostly work on college-level education now, but I have an interest in K12 too.
Q: How do you inspire girls, in particular, to be interested
in STEM?
A: While I don’t work directly with students, I work with teachers to help support them in incorporating different teaching practices – such as having students discuss ideas in groups, or getting students to work together to predict the outcome of an experiment. A lot of those sorts of techniques have been shown to help girls, and others who are often turned-off from science, persist in science.
Q: If you could take any fictional character out for a drink,
whom would you choose and what would you drink?
A: I’m a bit stumped on this one, but the best answer I can imagine is to take Sherlock Holmes (as played by Benedict Cumberbatch) out for a drink of Absinthe. Wouldn’t that be an interesting night!?
Q: What would you tell your 13-year-old self?
A: Relax and enjoy the ride….
Q: What’s the title of your memoir?
A: The meandering life of a GeekGirl: Explorations and inspirations towards finding wonder in the world
Emma Bauer is a Being Geek Chic Contributor. Clearly, she’s got great taste. She is a PR enthusiast, dog lover, tea drinker, art appreciator, and of course, aspires to Be Geek Chic. Follow her on Twitter: @emmalynnbauer
Sometimes you just need your mind blown. It’s that sense of boredom that creeps into your soul and doesn’t quite find relief from a quick run with loud music in your ears or an hour of staring at a few beautiful YouTube videos.
No. This is the feeling like: I need to FEEL SOMETHING IN MY GOD DAMN BELLY AND HEART AND MIND. I NEED TO CONNECT. I NEED TO RESET. I NEED TO FEEL THE FEELS.
That’s what I’m going after. And these books always do it.
Einstein’s Dreams by Alan Lightman
It would absolutely be fair for me to say that this book changed the whole course of my life. I know, bold statement. The moment it came into my life and the person that gave it to me hold such a sincerely beautiful place in my heart because there has never, ever, before or since, been a book that resonated so deeply. This book chronicles a series of fictional dreams journaled by Albert Einstein. Each entry is a perspective on time, and it’s meaning and relevance if time were to be measured from that perspective. It’s easy to knock out in an afternoon and I promise you’ll routinely find yourself saying: “time COULD be a circle.”
Particularly compelling quote from Einstein’s Dreams: “If a person holds no ambitions in this world, he suffers unknowingly. If a person holds ambitions, he suffers knowingly, but very slowly.”
I Feel Bad About My Neck and Other Reflections on Being a Woman by Nora Ephron
There is no shortage of genius in the Nora Ephron catalogue, but this collection of essays is one that I come back to time and time again. Why? Because Nora manages to hit the thing about being a person, specifically a human female person, right in the crosshairs of truth and pain and love and peace and rage and beauty and it sticks with you for weeks.
Particularly compelling quote from I Feel Bad About My Neck: “Oh, how I regret not having worn a bikini for the entire year I was twenty-six. If anyone young is reading this, go, right this minute, put on a bikini, and don’t take it off until you’re thirty-four.”
The Boys of My Youth By Jo Ann Beard
I love a 90s throwback in almost all areas of media consumption, but this particular 1999 best seller has stuck with me more than Clueless quotes. It’s especially compelling now in my late 20s, because each essay reminds me of a past love, a lesson learned from a man who I have since said goodbye too. Sometimes you need to be reminded that the deep emotional scars of love, while specifically each our own, are shared amongst so many of us. There’s a very good chance this book will make you cry. You have been warned.
Particularly compelling quote from The Boys of My Youth: “We sit silently in our living room. He watches the mute television screen and I watch him. The planes and ridges of his face are more familiar to me than my own. I understand that he wishes even more than I do that he still loved me.”
