WELocal Baltimore Newsletter

March 2019

WELocal at Baltimore, MD

From

Thursday, February 7th to Sunday, February 10th, a wonderful group of our members were attending the WE Local conference in Baltimore. This was an awesome opportunity for networking, professional development, fun, and becoming more involved in SWE! Read about all the awesome things we did and learned.

Table of Contents

Page: 2 - Good Morning, Baltimore!

2 - Wake Up, WELocal! Keynote 3 - Local Power Hour Keynote 3 - Filling the Homework Void 4 - SWE Next 4 - A Baby Boomer, a Gen-Xer, and a

Millennial Walk Into a ‌ 4 - WELocal Celebration 5 - Together Forward 5 - Craft Your Resume & Ace the Career Fair 6 - In It to Win It 6 - How to Make Friends at a Conference 6 - Get a Grip Wonder Woman 7 - Negotiating Salary 7 - Language of Success 7 - Building Diverse & Inclusive teams 8 - Concrete Steps to Make Your Workplace More Inclusive 8 - Nature-Inspired Innovation 9 - Creating Meaningful Learning Experiences 9 - WE Achieve Ceremony

GOOD MORNING, BALTIMORE! By: Alexandra Lee

When we weren’t attending conference sessions, Pitt

SWE had a blast exploring the city of Baltimore! After arriving on Thursday afternoon, we started off our time with a walk around the Baltimore inner harbor, full of old ships, stores, restaurants, museums, and an awesome backdrop for pictures. Then we made our way to the American Visionary Art Museum, three buildings full of quirky, imaginative art and installations and a huge gift shop famous for unique gifts. We then headed to grab some dinner at Mount Vernon Marketplace, a food hall with a variety of options for everyone; some of us opted to go for the true Maryland experience and get crab, and of course we had to end our meal with milkshakes! To end our night of exploring, we decided to check out The Walters Art Museum, a free museum with art spanning from 5,000 BCE to the 21st century, where we especially liked the European sculpture court. Over the course of the weekend, other non-conference activities included fun nights of hanging out and watching movies, checking out the nearby candy shop, and further exploring the inner harbor. After our couple of days exploring and enjoying the city, the official verdict is that Pitt SWE loves Baltimore!

Wake Up, WE Local!

By: Jackie Welsh

When we first begin college and start our careers,

we don’t know exactly how it’s supposed to go, but we have a general timeline. Finish undergrad, get a job, and maybe go back to school for a masters or study for the PE. There’s enough uncertainty in your early twenties, to have something to hold on to is reassuring. However, we listened to Barbara Rusinko from Bechtel talk about her career path.

From putting college on hold, to taking different positions within her role, Barbara’s career path has been anything but traditional. She recognized opportunities when they came and took risks with new industries. We learned from her to be willing to take risks, but also be willing to ask for help, because as long as you have the qualifications, you have the ability to succeed.

Local Power Hour Keynote By: Sarah Oldenburg At the conference, I heard two very inspiring women talk about their predictions for the future and their thoughts on the unequal number of men and women in the field.

Christine Fox, Assistant Director for policy and analysis of the JHU-APL Program, mentioned that a big reason there are few women in the STEM field is due to the fundamental nature of women to worry. If they are unsure of themselves and absorb responsibility like they often do, that brings on a lot of stress which leads many women to leave the career. She shared what she believes to be the solution; we must not hold back, instead, we should be confident and ready for anything. If we find brick walls along the way who refuse to support women, we should avoid them. She said “if you think you can, you can. If you think you can’t, you won’t.” This stuck with me and I hope to channel her confidence in the future when I need it.

Filling the Homework Void By: Daneen Haas

College is supposedly filled with a lot of “free time,” but as we

all know, studying, homework, and extra-curricular activities fill almost all that time to the point where you feel like you have something you should be doing every second of the day.

When college students graduate and get a normal 9-5 job, this constant to-do list of activities vanishes almost overnight.

This leaves a sudden overwhelming amount of after-work and weekend free time that we don’t know what to do with. Most people fill this new-found time with spending extra time at work, and while that could be beneficial for furthering your career, it is important to establish a good work-life balance. The speaker for this breakout session had some suggestions for navigating this difficult balance. She recommended using websites like Meetup to find things that you are interested in getting involved with outside of work. She also recommended scheduling activities with friends for right after the workday so that you are forced to leave the office by a certain time and not work late. If you are new to an area and don’t know many people, she suggested getting involved in Employee Resource Groups if your company offers them to meet new people in your organization.

SWEWho? SWENext!

By: Emily Richard

As an alumnus of SWENext, I was drawn to this session by Mary Zeis. Mary has a Chemical Engineering

degree from the University of Pittsburgh. She has 31 years of industry experience working for Proctor and Gamble. As she said herself, she is currently in the “pay it forward” time in her life, as a recent retiree.

And the way she has chosen to “pay it forward” is to become highly involved with SWE and leading the outreach program, SWENext. She is the SWENext workgroup lead on the outreach committee. She is also an active member of our regional Pittsburgh SWE section. Now you may still be wondering what exactly SWENext is. It is a free program for middle and high school students that connects them to STEM resources, events, and opportunities in their area. It was founded in 2015 and has since grown into having its own website, 4,295 members, and 2,705 graduates. I am proud to be one of them. In addition to the online component to the program, members are encouraged to begin their own clubs at their school. They are a great way for girls to join together with other girls in their school and begin to realize that they are not the only one interested in pursuing a STEM career. I can speak to this first hand since I started my own club my senior year of high school. Overall, SWENext has the mission to foster girls’ and boys’ STEM identity. The program wants to show its members the value of STEM and pursuing a STEM career. SWENext is a starting point for young students who want to explore their potential place in the STEM world. It is a gateway for a network of support and resources, and an eventual invitation to collegiate and societal SWE. I know it was for me!

“A Baby Boomer, a Gen-Xer, and a Millennial walk into a bar” By: Melina Hudson

This presentation discussed how to handle generational differences in the workplace. It was formatted as a

WELocal Celebration

jeopardy game where audience members picked a category that revealed a question. The question was then answered by a panel which contained currently employed engineers from each generation. A specific topic that arose was the changing model of work schedule. The panel noted how younger generations tend to expect hours that suit them, while older generations seemed to be on call 24/7 when they began working. It was also noted that while some younger employees struggle to be taken seriously, others are given serious responsibilities as an intern. No matter what question was posed, it was made clear that the key to bridging the generational gap is being open to every person’s values and understanding each other’s work styles. Representatives from the Baby Boomer generation said that they were open to answering questions about their past working experience so that younger generations could understand their perspective. It is also important that we find commonalities between generations, such as interests in movies, books, or sports, that can strengthen the community within a multigenerational workplace.

By: Laura Traczynski

During the first night of the conference, Pitt SWE members went to Celebrate SWE!

This was a casual event where we had the chance to relax and truly enjoy the conference! Conference attendees gathered in a comfortable atmosphere with a soothing band playing in the background.

Celebrate SWE offered Maryland’s classic cuisine, including crab cakes and bacon wrapped shrimp. For dessert, we enjoyed delicious pan fried donuts and ice cream. During the celebration, the WELocal committee raffled off gifts, and Erin Smith was lucky enough to win a gift card to Starbucks! The party also featured some fun activities, including bracelet-making and mini bowling.

We all had a blast at the WELocal Celebration, and it was the perfect way to end the first day of the conference!

Together Forward: Women and Men Collaborating in the Workforce By: Kelsey Prem

My favorite session at WELocal was ‘Together Forward’

by Omari Falkner, a presentation on how men and women can work together to advance women in the STEM fields.

He began by saying that gender diversity, and diversity in general, must be a topic that we are comfortable and confident to talk about in the workplace, because only these discussions can help us grow. We must stand up when we see people being treated unfairly, we must speak our minds, sharing that there is no diversity in the room, which is unacceptable. Omari then went on to say that only inviting women or minorities to the table to talk about how to add diversity to the company won’t change anything. We must work to find advocates and allies and invite everyone to the table to make a change. He ended his presentation by acknowledging that he realizes that when we’re the only women in the room it must not feel like we’re making a difference. To prove us wrong he brought in his three young daughters, ages 3, 5, and 6, who all had a chance to speak about an engineering project they’re working on in school, and how because of seeing all of us at the conference they want to be engineers, too. I know sometimes we get wrapped up in our school work and fail to see ourselves as an inspiration, but it’s important to remember that each of us that goes on to be an engineer is another woman in the field, and another example of the great heights we can soar to!

Craft Your Resume and Ace the Career Fair

By: Emma Ahlgren

As a freshman, WeLocal was my first experience

with a career fair. Although I wasn’t looking for an internship or co-op just yet, it was a great opportunity to practice talking to different companies. I was able to apply a lot of what I learned from a session earlier in the weekend about crafting a resume and tips for a career fair. Some of the session’s most helpful career fair tips were: wear an outfit you feel comfortable and confident in, don’t go to your top company first, and take notes after leaving each booth. The note-taking tip was especially useful for me, as it allowed me to take some time to relax and collect my thoughts before moving on to the next booth. It’s also great for jotting down any specific details that can make your follow-up emails more personal and engaging. The session also provided a lot of great advice on creating a stellar resume.

Something I found interesting was that classroom projects (detailing your responsibilities and contributions) can be highlighted if you don’t have relevant work experience. As a first-year student, it was great to know of an alternative way to express my work ethic and accountability. Another tip was to find key words in the job description and incorporate them into your resume. This is a subtle but effective technique to customize your resume for each potential position. Overall, WeLocal was an incredibly useful and exciting experience, and I’m so grateful for my time there!

in it to win it

By: Dana Emswiler At WeLocal Baltimore, I attended an inspiring and relevant breakout session on how to make the most of your time in the workplace and office settings. Health and wellness is an arbitrary concept but no matter how you choose to define it, maintaining it while working in an office environment can be tough. While exercising and working out outside of work is vital, it does not cancel out the amount someone is stationary during work. Sitting – or even standing – for approximately 1/3 of your entire 24-hour day and 1/2 of your hours awake is detrimental to your health. However, it is simple to implement small tweaks to your office routine which can make a big difference! Consider conducting a walking meeting, balancing on one leg during a phone call, pacing while on a conference call, or doing five chair squats every time you get up or sit down at your desk. Focusing on small changes like these can drastically improve your overall health and productivity.

How to Make Friends at a Conference By: Erin Smith

A conference is a pretty great place for an extrovert! Here are my best tips on how to make friends at a conference.

1) Pay attention to who asks which questions during a breakout session. I approached a girl after a session and it turned out that she was a student, too! She was a freshman at Drexel and had great experience in one of my biggest interests, humanitarian engineering. 2) Go sit by yourself. Sitting by myself at the Networking Breakfast was the best meal of the trip because I had the chance to meet a wide variety of people at once. I sat at the Alternative Engineering table and met engineers who were lawyers, data scientists, property insurance agents, MBA students, etc. This is a good tip for introverts because odds are that the person who approaches your table will be extroverted and can lead the conversation. 3) Ask them about themselves, it’s the fastest way to find out what you have in common. At the awards dinner, I met a junior, chemical engineer that was a Johnson & Johnson co-op, just like me! 4) Put yourself out there because you never know who you will meet!

Get a Grip Wonder Woman

By: Kayla Ruslavage

During Karen Badger’s session, “Get a Grip Wonder Woman,” I learned about being able to recognize

my strengths while also acknowledging the fact that I can’t do everything. One of the major things she stressed was knowing what gives you an advantage over everyone else, while also seeing how those strengths can become weaknesses when you stretch yourself too thin. The most valuable part of the session was her advice on knowing when to say no to opportunities and how to do so. Many times, people don’t want to say no to opportunities that others may have given them because they don’t want to be rude or disappoint the person asking. However, it is important to know your priorities and how to decline tasks or positions that may divert you from your career or personal goals. Some ways of doing this are to train others to do the task so the responsibility is shifted, or to ask the person which of your other important tasks should be deprioritized in order to make time for the new project. These methods will help in being respectful while declining extra responsibilities that even us female engineers (aka – Wonder Women) just can’t handle.

Negotiating Sallary

By: Maya McCann

This session was about negotiating offers of salary,

benefits, and your overall worth. The purpose was to prove that it doesn’t hurt to ask for more because the worst they can say to you is no. The main scenario that the session setup was that you are offered a position for a job and you are the main person the company would like to hire. Employers like when you use negotiating tactics because it shows that you’re willing to step out of your comfort zone and have confidence.

The 4 major steps to negotiating are to assess, prepare, ask, and package. This means that you must assess the benefits and costs by understanding the offer. Then, you must prepare by knowing what they’re looking for and what you are looking for in the position. Next, you must ask by engaging and sharing what makes you unique. Finally, you must package by bundling your alternative proposal to the company.

Some things to consider in your “package” is salary, 401k, hours, company culture, and other benefits.

Overall, you must calculate your value of worth based off of the position being offered. Knowing your worth as a professional will benefit you in the long run.

Language of Success

By: Alyssa Bell Christine Stahlecker presented numerous tips from “How to Say It for Women” by Phyllis Mindel to transform weak, submissive emails into direct requests which emulate success in the workplace. In general, always avoid weak words such as “sorry”, “I guess”, “I just”, “I think”, “I feel”, etc. Removing emotional language that places you in a submissive position will strengthen your communications. For example, “Sorry to bother you, but I feel like there might be an error in this report” utilizes weak language and is more simply stated as “There is an error in this report.” Additionally, refrain from making yourself the subject of the email, unless you are directly involved in the email. Also, choose strong action verbs that pertain to the subject. In transitioning from passive to active voice, some statements may sound pushy or demanding. In these cases, it is recommended to send the direct request but also ask for feedback or suggestions. These examples of weak language can be caught in proofreading your emails before hitting send. I plan to read the remainder of “How to Say It for Women” to gain even more insight into professional language.

Building Diverse and Inclusive Teams

By: Elise Harrison

For a team to be productive, each of its members must be productive. In order for that to happen, it’s important

for every person to feel that they are a part of the culture of the team. There are a few stages that teams should go through to become inclusive – forming, storming, norming, and performing. Forming is the first stage when team members act independently and avoid conflict. This is when the ground rules are created.

Next is storming, when conflict arises. There becomes tension from expression of individuality, questions, or competition. Norming is when team members mutually accept each other and establish group-generated norms. Performing comes last, when there is a shared team vision and common goals. Sometimes teams will move right through these four steps, but it’s ok to take a few steps back if anything changes in order to get back to performing. Each of these stages is very important to a team’s productivity and to the inclusion of each of its members. Teams that try to skip stages, and team members that act without seeking information from people different from them to develop a broader picture, will ultimately be less successful. “Diversity is being invited to the party, inclusion is being asked to dance.” Be curious, ask for feedback from team members, and learn from people different from yourself.

Concrete Steps to Making your Workplace More Inclusive By: Mary Cumpston

This outstanding breakout session was led by a woman

trained to run workshops in the professional setting on the topics of diversity and inclusion. At the start of the presentation, we each got a small cup with a piece of string and plastic beads. The presenter then showed us a series of statements, and if we agreed with the statement, we would transfer a bead from our cup into another empty cup. We went through statements on race, gender, religion, disability, and sexuality. At the end of the activity, we took all the beads we transferred, and put them on the string. The beads act as a measure of privilege—the more statements you can answer “yes” to, the more privileged you are. This is a very difficult topic to discuss because I think, a lot of the time, people have difficulty understanding what privilege is and where it comes from. This exercise was a great way to visualize how much we have, and to understand what gives us more. I think this would be a great activity to do within the professional setting to make employees more aware and conscious of their privileges.

Nature-Inspired Innovation By: Anaya Espadas

This breakout session led by Dr. Jacquelyn Nagel

of James Madison University focused on the application of biomimicry in the design process.

Learning from your surroundings in nature can provide inspiration to model designs for solving the challenges we face, and the resulting product is often more effective and sustainable than previous man-made designs. Biomimicry does not mean taking the exact shape or build of an organism and creating it into a usable tool, but rather being inspired by certain elements of an organism. For example, the edge of a wind turbine blade was designed with bumps as inspired by a whale’s tail. Despite intuition, the blade was found to be more aerodynamic with the whale-like bumps rather than being smooth, and thus it was able to produce more power.

How to Create Meaningful Learning Experiences

By: Emily Zuris During the conference, I was able to attend a session on how to create meaningful learning experiences. We went through some examples of engaging and non-engaging teaching techniques.

The speaker, Dr. Nagel, explained that engaging learning environments where students work together, ask questions, and become more involved in the lesson are where we learn best. In order to create a meaningful learning experience, there are seven main considerations: 1.

Is it appropriate for the age/abilities of the participants?

2.

Does it have a hook that will interest the participants?

3.

Is it interactive?

4.

Does it encourage visualization?

5.

Does it require writing?

6.

Does it require meta-cognitive reflection?

7.

Is there an effective rubric or set of expectations?

These seven questions allow you to evaluate class lessons, projects, and even outreach events based on how meaningful of an experience it will create for your students. An activity does not need to possess every single element for it to be meaningful, but these are good guidelines and at least most of them should be reflected in your educational activities. As an outreach chair, I hope to use these guidelines while planning future events!

We Achieve Ceremony By: Rachel Blum

On our last night in Baltimore, we attended the We Achieve

Ceremony. After enjoying a delicious (and fancy) dinner, we turned our attention to the final keynote speaker of the conference, Ann Darrin, Space Executive of Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. A small woman with a big sense of humor, Ann did not disappoint.

Her talk highlighted how far women in engineering have come since she first entered the defense industry over thirty years ago. Ann noted how we have to pick our battles wisely, “sometimes we need to know when to persist and when to just let go of the banana and move on”. She focused on how great it is to achieve as well as fail since “being proud of your failures and rejections will only make you awesomer.” In the end, her sarcastic humor and hilarious cartoons had us rolling with laughter as well as thinking on how far we have come and how far we have to go. When asked what keeps her motivated to keep doing all of this, Ann replied dramatically, “the greatest technology of all time: direct deposit”.