Planting Seeds of Happiness: Ada Lovelace Day

This year's Ada Lovelace Day (http://www.computerhistory.org/babbage/adalovelace/) was on October 16th. On this day, some celebrate women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) in honor of the world's first programmer, Ada Lovelace. After talking to a couple of senior and junior girls in the beginning of the school year, I realized some of our female students needed more information about the field of computer technology and encouragement to pursuit it as a career. I met some of these bright young women when they volunteered in our library, and the others I got to know for they visited the library on a regular basis. When the topic of their future careers came up, they said it would be cool to work for Google or Facebook. They aparently lacked knowledge about the profession and the diversity of the field of engineering and technology. Taking advantage of the time I had with them, I told them computer engineering is more than programming. The field has deep connections with other disciplines. In addition, computer engineers of various types can have very different responsibilities and work environments.

These girls became my motivation for setting up a display in the library for Ada Lovelace Day. I created a informational display using both digital and print materials. On a Mac desktop, I looped videos about Ada Lovelace and inspiring modern female engineers and scientists:

http://pioneers.bcs.org/pioneer-profiles/ada-lovelace

http://www.ted.com/themes/women_reshaping_the_world.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/award_winning_teen_age_science_in_action.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/heather_knight_silicon_based_comedy.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/amy_smith_shares_simple_lifesaving_design.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/nina_tandon_caring_for_cells.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/natalie_jeremijenko_the_art_of_the_eco_mindshift.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/margaret_wertheim_crochets_the_coral_reef.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/cynthia_breazeal_the_rise_of_personal_robots.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/rachel_armstrong_architecture_that_repairs_itself.html

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/christien_meindertsma_on_pig_05049.html

A libGuide created by our librarian about careers in mathematics was used as an interactive display.