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Empowering Women Students in Engineering: MentorNet |
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MentorNet, is a national electronic mentoring network for undergraduate and graduate women students in engineering and science. Through its website, www.mentornet.net, the organization links students, via E-mail, with industry and research professionals. Nearly 11,000 matches have been made since 1998. This year, Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, a founding member of MentorNet, far exceeded the national average for women enrolled in engineering schools. We set out to find out why? What we learned is that top-notch colleges and universities across the nation have a number of ways to attract women to their engineering programs. Like Cornell, these top schools have women undergraduate enrollment above the national average and want to ensure they do not lose gains they have made. Universities looking to swell the ranks of women engineers agree that a major ingredient toward success, is emphasizing the social aspect of the field. We explore programs at Cornell, University of California, and MIT, which are ahead of the curve in their appeal to women, and also look at what has yet to be done. Allison Dunne reports. (11:32)
This story features interviews with: Dr. Krishna Athreya, Director, Women’s Programs in Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York; Dr. Christine Shoemaker, Joseph P. Ripley Professor of Engineering, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Cornell University; Dr. Alice Agogino, Roscoe and Elizabeth Hughes, Professor of Mechanical Engineering, and President, Association of Academic Women, University of California, Berkeley; Irene Miller, Manager, Faculty Diversity Search, School of Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Other websites mentioned in the story include Society of Women Engineers and Engineers for a Sustainable World. |
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