April 19, 2000

Conference=Confidence

Students find role models at Girls+Math+Science=Choices

By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
       By sixth grade, girls are already beginning to make choices. Choices that limit future choices, like that they are not good in math or science is too hard for them. Choices that limit the possibility of a future career in medicine, engineering, aviation or the sciences.
      To counter this trend and encourage girls to continue studying math and science throughout their school years, the Grand Traverse Regional Math and Science Center hosted the Girls + Math + Science = Choices Conference Saturday at Northwestern Michigan College. The conference drew 130 girls in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades and more than 70 parents from schools around the region.
      Breakout sessions brought the girls together with role models working in math, science and technical fields, who talked about their training and careers. Area science teachers also led attendees through hands-on experiments in the sciences. Parents also met with the role models and received advice on encouraging their children to continue taking math and science courses throughout high school.
      For some girls, this concentrated day of encouragement helped them continue to dream.
      "I like science, especially animal science," said Iris Lessard, a sixth-grader at Glen Lake Schools. "I am interested in pursuing it as a career and this day helped me."
      Keynote speaker for the conference was Dr. Sylvia Earle, a world-renowned oceanographer and currently an Explorer in Residence with the National Geographic Society. She shared her love of science and the oceans with the girls, using video footage of her deep-sea dives. She told the girls that they are needed in the sciences: with 95 percent of the ocean still unexplored, it is up to the next generation to figure out the mysteries of the deep.
      "The greatest era of exploration has just begun," said Earle, who also gave a public presentation on her life and work Friday evening at Traverse City West Senior High School, drawing 250 people to her talk. "There is so much more we need to understand about the ocean and the importance of it to us. You can make a difference."
      Earle started her post-high school studies at a Florida junior college at age 16. She received her bachelor's degree from Florida State and her master's degree and Ph.D. from Duke University, taking a 10-year hiatus between the two degrees to raise her two daughters.
      She recalled for the audience her early days of diving, fighting to be allowed to accompany men on underwater missions. Noting that female divers then were referred to 'acquabelles' or 'acquababes,' Earle remarked that as long as they let her dive she did not care what they called her.
      In 1969, Earle was excluded from the Tektite project, an underwater enclosed habitat jointly sponsored by the Navy, the Department of the Interior and NASA, because she was female. This happened despite her having 1,000 hours of underwater research; more than anyone else who applied. In 1979, she walked untethered 1,250 feet below the surface, holding the world's record for this feat. Since then she has authored many books, founded companies that construct undersea equipment and worked as a Chief Scientist with the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.
      "When I was young, women were just flat out told that, 'No, you cannot go to MIT. You cannot go where you need to go to get the training you want,'" Earle said. "Find your own way and do not get discouraged by people who say you can't do that or you don't have the coursework. When all else fails you have to have confidence in yourself."
      Science teacher Linda Williams, a ninth-grade biology teacher at East Junior High, says that confidence is crucial to encouraging girls to continue with math and science classes. In her teaching career, she has personally seen girls by the sixth- grade already saying 'I can't' about science.
      She has seen that publicity, encouragement and conferences like Girls + Math + Science = Choices are starting to make a difference.
      "In the last five years, I do get more girls asking me for advice about what to take in high school if they want to pursue science," Williams said. "Parents are also starting to realize that there are opportunities for girls in math and science, unlike years ago when women had a hard time even getting into medical school."