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IBM sponsors environmental projects for La Familia week
Armonk, NY - As part of the fourth annual La Familia technology week during Hispanic Heritage Month, IBM recently sponsored the participation of hundreds of middle school students in environmental projects in Guadalajara, Mexico as well as New York, NY and three more cities across the U.S.
The week is designed to show Hispanic families and their children the importance of technology in education and career preparation. During the week, IBM also launched "Partnering with IBM in education," a year-long, K-12 program developed to help Hispanic students stay in school and succeed there.
To learn more about these programs, visit www.lafamilianet.net.
Kaiser Permanente, PG&E tie for top GLBT award
Tempe, AZ - Kaiser Permanente and Pacific Gas and Electric Co tied for the top Outie award, for workplace excellence, at the fourteenth annual Out & Equal workplace summit. HP received an Outie award for significant achievement.
Employees of Ford and Eastman Kodak Co, and the Eastman Kodak Lambda network, also received awards.
American Chemical Society seeks minority scholarship applicants
Washington, DC - The American Chemical Society (www.acs.org) will accept 2005-06 academic year applications for its Scholars Program until March 1, 2005. The program offers financial support for underrepresented minority students in the chemical sciences.
African American, Hispanic/Latino and Native American recipients are eligible to receive renewable awards of $2,500 to $3,000. Students in chemistry, chemical engineering, biochemistry, environmental science and related disciplines at two- and four-year colleges are eligible.
The scholarships are supported by contributions from AstraZeneca, Bayer, DuPont, GlaxoSmithKline, PPG, Procter & Gamble, Xerox and other companies. Visit chemistry.org/scholars or call 1-800-227-5558, ext 6250 for details and an online application.
Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day goes global
Alexandria, VA - Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day has become so popular in the United States that it's going global. In preparation for the fifth annual Introduce a Girl to Engineering Day, February 24, 2005, hundreds of organizations worldwide will mobilize tens of thousands of engineers. They hope to reach a million girls that day and throughout the year with direct, hands-on mentoring activities.
The day is an element of National Engineers Week, February 20-26, 2005. The week's activities include a variety of efforts to encourage underrepresented groups to consider careers in engineering. In the U.S., only ten percent of all engineers are women.
The 2005 Girl Day effort is led by Engineers Week co-chairs, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and BP plc. Major sponsors are Agilent Technologies and the S.D. Bechtel, Jr Foundation.
Girl Day was launched in 2001 by the National Society of Professional Engineers, IBM, the Society of Women Engineers, Women in Engineering Programs and Advocates Network, and MentorNet. For more information on Engineers Week and its programs, see www.eweek.org.
New study of women's employment in technology finds mixed results
Washington, DC - During the last two decades, growth in the employment of women in scientific, technical, engineering and mathematical (STEM) occupations has been uneven, says a report from the Commission on Professionals in Science and Technology (CPST).
From 1983 to 2003, the commission found increases for women in the social and natural sciences, but minimal change in engineering and a decline in math and computer science.
- 44 percent of all jobs in the U.S. were held by women in 1983, rising to 47 percent by 2003. In STEM occupations, the proportion was 19 percent; it rose to 26 percent in 2002.
- Only 10 percent of the jobs in engineering were held by women in 1983; in 2002 it was 14 percent. The largest gains were in ChE.
- In computer science, the percentage of jobs held by women was lower at the end of the twenty-year period than it was in 1983. But overall growth in IT occupations was so strong during the 1990s that even while women's share of these jobs was declining, their absolute numbers continued to increase through the year 2000. After that the share started to decline.
"These are disappointing findings for STEM workforce policymakers and others who have worked for at least a quarter of a century to make better use of the talent of women in U.S. science and engineering," says CPST.
The CPST report, "Women in science and technology: the sisyphean challenge of change," is the second in a series from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation-funded STEM workforce data project. The project uses U.S. government stats as well as private sources of information to identify, compile and distribute reliable statistics on STEM workers in the U.S.
The study and its data archive are available free on CPST's website, www.cpst.org. The next two reports, one on immigrants in the STEM workforce and one on underrepresented minorities, will be released in early 2005.
HRC releases 2004 corporate equality index
Washington, DC - Fifty-six companies scored 100 percent on the Human Rights Campaign Foundation's corporate equality index for 2004. That's double the number that made it to the top in 2003. Among the fifty-six were many that employ significant numbers of engineering or IT pros.
These are the high-scoring companies: Aetna Inc, Agilent Technologies Inc, American Airlines (AMR Corp), American Express Co, Apple Computer Inc, AT&T Corp, Avaya Inc, Bausch & Lomb Inc, Capital One Financial Corp, Cargill Inc, the Charles Schwab Corp, Chubb Corp, Cisco Systems Inc, Citigroup Inc, Coors Brewing Co.
Dell Inc, Deutsche Bank, Eastman Kodak Co, Ford Motor Co, Goldman Sachs, Hewlett-Packard Co, IBM Corp, Intel Corp, JP Morgan Chase & Co, Keyspan, Kraft Foods Inc, Lehman Brothers, Levi Strauss & Co, Lucent Technologies Inc.
MetLife Inc, Miller Brewing Co, Motorola Inc, Nationwide, NCR Corp, Nike Inc, Owens Corning, PepsiCo Inc, Pfizer Inc, PG&E Corp, Prudential Financial Inc.
Replacements Ltd, SC Johnson & Son Inc, Southern California Edison Co, UBS, Financial Services Inc, Wells Fargo & Co, Whirlpool Corp, Worldspan Technologies Inc, Xerox Corp.
Companies were rated from 0 to 100 percent, based on whether they:
- Include the words "sexual orientation" in their written non-discrimination policy; include the words "gender identity" or "gender identity and/or expression" in their written non-discrimination policy. Offer health insurance coverage to employees' same-sex domestic partners firm-wide or provide cash compensation to employees to purchase health insurance for a domestic partner on their own.
- Officially recognize and support a GLBT employee resource group; or would support employees forming one; or have a firm-wide diversity council or working group whose mission specifically includes GLBT diversity.
- Offer diversity training that includes sexual orientation and/or gender identity and expression in the workplace; engage in respectful and appropriate marketing to the GLBT community or support GLBT health, educational, political or community organizations or events.
- Do not engage in corporate action that would undermine the goal of equal rights for GLBT people.
For the full report, see www.hrc.org.
Teresa Vanhooser is co-director of engineering at NASA's MSFC
Huntsville, AL - Teresa Vanhooser has been appointed co-deputy director of the engineering directorate at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
Vanhooser will help lead an organization responsible for design, test, evaluation and operation of hardware and software associated with space transportation, spacecraft systems, and science instruments and payloads being developed at the Marshall Center.
The directorate also manages the operation of scientific research aboard the International Space Station.
Vanhooser has spent twenty-four years at NASA in a variety of technical and technology management positions, and most recently served as deputy director of the flight projects directorate. She received a BSIE from Tennessee Technological University in 1980 and a masters in administrative science and PM from the University of Alabama-Huntsville in 1986.
HENAAC presents Hispanic achievement awards
Pasadena, CA - At the sixteenth annual Hispanic Engineer National Achievement Awards Conference this past October, engineers from industry, government and the military were honored. Here are some of this year's winners of the coveted awards:
Hispanic engineer of the year: H. Alex Archila, president, Chevron Canada Resources, ChevronTexaco Corp.
Executive excellence: Michael J. Cave, SVP, airplane programs, the Boeing Co; Philip A. Dur, PhD, president, Northrop Grumman Ship Systems and corporate VP, Northrop Grumman.
Outstanding technical achievement, industry: Maria Azua, IBM distinguished engineer, IBM Corp; Cipriano A. Santos, PhD, senior scientist, HP.
Outstanding technical achievement, national labs: Aaron A. Diaz, staff scientist, nondestructive characterization and measurement sciences group, national security directorate, Pacific Northwest National Labs; Michael D. Kaminski, PhD, materials engineer and leader, nanoscale engineering group, Argonne National Lab.
Pioneer award: Juan A. Murillo, PE, SVP and principal professional associate, executive tech manager and tech director for major bridges, Parsons Brinckerhoff.
Chairman's award: Marcos S. de Oliveira, president and CEO, Ford of Mexico, Ford Motor Co.
Professional achievement: Grace D. Lieblein, executive director, global manufacturing system implementation leader, GM Corp; Santiago A. Bulnes, senior manager, F-35 JSF flight control systems integrated product team lead, Lockheed Martin Corp.
Albert V. Baez award: Juan J. Ramirez, PhD, technical and programmatic consulting, Sandia National Labs.
Most promising engineer, advanced degree: Luis Francisco Garfias, PhD, principal investigator, reliability research dept, Lucent Technologies.
Military excellence, professional achievement, uniformed: Lt Cdr Eduardo R. Fernandez, Jr, executive officer, USS Henry M. Jackson, U.S. Navy.
Military excellence, professional achievement, civilian: Maria Isabel Diaz-Goode, chief, artillery branch, munitions and weapons division, U.S. Army.
Military excellence, most promising engineer, civilian: Monica J. Velasco, acting value engineering officer for the Alaska district, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Most promising engineer, undergraduate degree: Lourdes C. Martinez, software engineer II, Raytheon; Richard K. Martinez, ESS software development engineer, IBM.
Santiago Rodriguez diversity award: Joaquin M. Otero, HR director, diversity, space and airborne systems, Raytheon.
Community service: Alma Martinez Fallon, hull structural construction superintendent for the CVN-21, Northrop Grumman.
Luminary award: Eric A. Gonzalez, manager, GM liaison office, GM/NUMM.
For more information about the winners and the conference, check out www.henaac.org.
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