Jump to the 1:30 mark to listen.
This week Kris Abel introduces What She Said’s Christine Bentley, Sharon Caddy, and Kate Wheeler to…
Beatty Robotics
14 year-old Camille and 12 year-old Genevieve Beatty have co-founded their own robotics company where they create a wide variety of walking, flying, and wheeled creations as well as museum-quality reproductions of lunar vehicles. It’s an impressive accomplishment coming from two girls who had little more than internet access and some supportive parents to tech themselves the skills needed.
These girls make #robots. #NationOfMakers pic.twitter.com/z1PNY4Ytpf
— The White House OSTP (@whitehouseostp) June 18, 2014
Soofa
A company formed by Jutta Friedrichs, Sandra Richter, and Nan Zhao, Soofa creates public urban furniture that can help collect and organize information about urban noise and air pollution levels while providing free charging for pedestrians. Already they have orders for twelve of the benches in Cambridge & Boston plus one now at the White House.
With only 1% of high school girls taking an interest in computer science, Google has decided to invest $50 million over the next three years and help US organizations like the MIT Media Lab, Girl Scouts, and Girls Inc. to launch programs that will help change that figure.
Online they’ve launched a website offering projects and stories aimed at helping anyone get involved. Most importantly it offers tools to help even non-techy parents to get their girls to take an interest.
The website profiles the stories of a collection of Mentors, women with major careers based on coding, and Makes, young women who are just getting started.
I’m including Mentor Danielle Feinberg who works at Pixar and codes all the lighting you see in their movies.
And Maker Maddy Maxey who wants to code new fashions innovations such as fabrics that won’t shrink after washing.
