Trinity Conference Observes International Day of Women and Girls in STEM 

Trinity College recently hosted young students from the Hartford community at an event celebrating the 10th anniversary of the International Day of Women and Girls in STEM, which is observed annually on February 11.   

The day was officially adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015 to promote the full and equal access and participation of women in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields.  

Local students from Black Girls Achieve, the Boys and Girls Club, Grace Academy, and Conard High School WiSTEM were invited to Trinity’s program—held February 7 in the Albert C. Jacobs Life Sciences Center’s Boyer Auditorium—to take part in hands-on activities led by Trinity faculty members and Trinity student volunteers.  

“It’s important for them to see themselves as someone who could pursue a career in STEM,” said Sarah A. Raskin, associate dean for faculty development and Charles A. Dana Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience. “Being surrounded by other girls from the community and mentored by Trinity students and faculty through explorations of STEM will hopefully spark more curiosity about STEM, even if they don’t pursue it as a career.”  

The activities included learning about neurons by making pipe cleaner model, dissecting sheep brains, creating chemical structures with models, and coloring graphs to learn about graph theory.  

Cheyenne S. Brindle, Charles A. Dana Research Associate Professor of Chemistry, said that the student guests also enjoyed experimenting with cabbage dye as a pH indicator. “It was a lot of fun for everyone involved,” Brindle said, “and you could see the confidence in all the participants and the interest that everyone had in trying new combinations to make new reactions and color combinations.”  

Raskin and Brindle are members of Trinity’s Women in STEM Committee, which organized this program. “We are actively involved in promoting the work of female faculty in STEM by highlighting achievements, research, and success of Trinity’s STEM female-identifying faculty,” Brindle said of the committee.  

Brindle added that research shows that interest in the STEM fields for women is strong up until middle school, then they begin to drift away from STEM fields, in part because these areas are viewed as more masculine pursuits. “It’s important for students to see scientists that share a gender identity with themselves so that they can picture themselves in the STEM fields,” she said. “We want to show that science is both fun and interesting, to keep students engaged. I hope they have fun doing a STEM activity and associate science with a good time. I want them to feel excited about discovery and see that they can get involved in experimentation and exploration.”   

Trinity students helped to run the workshops for the younger students. “I hope to foster conversations among these students so that the younger group can ask about the college students’ experiences in selecting a school and pursuing STEM fields,” Brindle said.   

The International Day of Women and Girls in STEM event at Trinity began with a keynote talk by Nikisha Patel, assistant professor of biology, titled “Plant Genome Size and the Evolution of Diversity.”  

Additional members of the Trinity faculty then presented “Data Blitz Talks” about their own research: Kirsti A. Kuenzel, associate professor of mathematics, “Domination in Product Graphs”; Kelly M. Patton, assistant professor of physics, “Presupernova Neutrinos: Tracing the Isotopic Composition of Massive Stars Over Time”; and Brindle, “Creating Molecules that Capture Light to Power Chemical Reactions.” 

The day also included time for “faculty speed mentoring,” when early-career faculty who are women in STEM could ask questions and seek advice from their colleagues. Raskin said, “People left with a better understanding and appreciation of some of the research that takes place on campus, which can lead to deeper conversations or collaborations.”  

Trinity faculty members advocate for additional engagement with youth in STEM literacy and curiosity through events like this. “But because there are so many more barriers for people who identify as girls and women, it is important to carve out a special time and place where you can ensure they feel welcome and included,” Raskin said.