FLATE & St. John State Join efforts to Recruit
& Retain Women in STEM Careers Pathways
All across the board educators, advisors, counselors and
industry leaders are increasingly voicing a real and ever-present challenge of
recruiting and retaining women in STEM careers. To address some of these
concerns, and to start a platform for an open dialogue, FLATE—NSF Center of
Excellence in Advanced Technological Education presented a workshop hosted by
St. John River State College (SJRSC), Orange Park Campus in Orange Park,
FL. The professional development workshop, “Recruiting Girls for STEM
Pathways”, featured best practices for educators, recruiters, counselors,
advisors, and anyone interested in promoting STEM careers to women and girls.
Participants who attended the workshop had the opportunity
to interact with a panel of two STEM female experts and one female STEM
student, explored STEM based resources, shared current female recruitment practices
and engaged in teamwork to develop strategic action plans. The action
plans included both short and long-term goals to recruit and retain female STEM
programs.
Based on a post survey conducted by FLATE, over 95% of
participants who responded the survey (22 out of 25) rated good and/or
excellent their satisfaction with the overall professional development value
provided during the “Women in STEM-Career Pathways Recruitment and Retention
workshop”. The same percentage of responses indicated that they are
planning to use the information presented, will recommend this type of workshop
to other colleagues, and agreed and/or strongly agreed that the workshop is an
effective way to promote the importance of women in STEM career pathways
recruitment and retention. Nearly 90% of people surveyed also agreed and/or
strongly agreed that the STEM professional panel was engaging and provided
important advice regarding female recruitment and retention. Approximately 95%
of responses also agreed and/or strongly agreed the Round Robin and group
session provided a big picture of current practices and potential action plan
to improve the recruitment and retention of females in their programs.
Comments from Participants:
“Having these discussions and listening to different
viewpoints and perspectives will help in everyday decision-making process in
our role as educators and advisors”
“I love the panel and the brainstorming. This was
wonderful; I learned a lot”
“Great platform to share ideas, planning, and experience”
For more details about the workshop including the
presentations, please visit FLATE’s wiki presentation page,
or contact Marilyn Barger at barger@fl-ate.org
For additional information related resources visit www.fl-ate.org and www.madeinflorida.org.
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