Shattering the Glass Ceiling By: Gillian Manning The stories of three determined women in STEM Women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) have historically been a minority in these male-dominated fields, and while diversity is on the rise, students today are not strangers to this imbalance. According to the American Association of University Women, men outnumber women majoring in STEM fields and women only make up 28% of the STEM workforce, and engineering is the field with the smallest female presence.
Alany Jaury Alany Jaury is studying for her Bachelor’s in mechanical engineering and is treasurer of the university’s chapter of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. She began her journey in STEM at a young age, being very involved in her high school’s robotics club.
From top to bottom: Nafisa Shikdar, Alany Jaury, and Sameerah Hingoo.
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With her bedroom covered in space memorabilia, her passions are clear: Jaury wants to work for NASA. Her goal is to one-day be involved with NASA’s Artemis project which aims to send the next man and the first woman to the moon by 2024, and she hopes to be involved with other multi-planetary missions.
“The majesty of a big machine taking something into space...it’s amazing,” said Jaury. She has begun following that dream by getting involved with NASA’s virtual L’SPACE (Lucy Student Pipeline Accelerator and Competency Enabler) Academy this spring. The L’SPACE Academy is an educational program for students. It is made of two smaller programs, and of those two, Jaury is involved with the Mission Concept Academy. These programs collaborate with NASA’s Lucy Mission, which aims to explore the asteroids surrounding Jupiter. With a team of students from across the country, Jaury engineers plans and technology that could potentially help NASA land on the asteroids and other planets such as Venus. The women-to-men ratio is relatively equal in the NASA program, according to Jaury, with many of her group’s leaders being women, but her experience at school does not fully reflect that. “You take notice that you’re a minority,” said Jaury who explained that her classes and clubs are still male-dominated.
