Drexeluniversity

Societyofwomenengineers

fall 2015 & conference edition

part i

fall 2015 newsletter

part ii

we15 national conference

october 22-24, 2015
nashville, tn

part i
fall edition

overview of fall term events & presidents letter

team accomplished this year. We hosted the
largest region E conference in in February
2015, won outstanding gold section for the
third year in a row at WE15, and planned
countless events on campus.

Inside this issue...

Letter from the President
Membership Committee
Professional Development
Networking
Outreach
Wellness
SWEet Summit
Conference Attendees
Experience Blurbs
Career Fair
SWEFL & CLI
Women Defining the Future
Awards & Recognition
Celebrate SWE
Sponsors & Thank You

1
2

With excitement I welcome Danielle Schroeder

as the new section president. I have great
confidence in her leadership as well as that of
the other members of the officer team. I look
forward to seeing the awesome events and
ideas they come up with in 2016!

2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
11
12
13

Letter from the president

Sam Schneider, President

After getting involved in Drexel SWE my freshman year, I cant believe Im finally a senior.
SWE has made such a positive impact in my
life. I hope that many other SWE members can
experience how SWE can help them obtain
their personal and professional goals. Over the
past four years, Ive worked with over 55
Drexel SWE officers and met even more members. Im so proud of everything that the officer

Connect with uS!

Drexel Society of
Women Engineers

swe.drexel@gmail.com

@drexelswe

drexelswe

fall 2015
membership committee
Fall term was a great success for membership!
We started the term with our first General
Body Meeting, hosting over 80 members, new
and old. We shared dinner, learned about
SWE, and played a word guessing game. At
GBM 2, members had the chance to suggest
ideas to SWE and to tell us what were doing
right so far. Sophomore electrical engineering
student, Amy Shapiro, recommended that we
try harder to learn each others names because,
well, thats important! At GBM 3, we personalized name tags and played a successful name
game. Amy explained, As hokey as name
games can be, I appreciated the chance to learn

names sans awkward introductions. At

Boardgames with Orgs, SWE members came
together with other student organizations like
ASME to socialize, network, and play classic
games. Jacque, the membership director
instructed a relaxing and powerful yoga flow in
drexel park at sunset. The attendees really
enjoyed the flow and said it had a great balance
of postures. Seventeen of us gathered to share a
dinner at Han Dynasty to celebrate last terms
active members and our national SWE members. Be an active member and sign up for
national membership and reap every benefit
SWE has to offer!

Han Dynasty membership dinner

Yoga during sunset with SWE officers!

professional development committee

This Fall term the PD team hosted one of the
best attended events. Mr. Raj Subramanyam
from CSL Behring spoke on achieving success
in a corporate career and how to optimize ones
online presence in order to gain an advantage
towards the career building path. The presentations were delivered with high interaction
from the audience resulting in a valuable learning experience that provided the essential
foundation for college students. Mr. Raj pro-

vided attendees with accessibility to online

resources as well to help with continued education on these topics. Professional Development
also hosted an event with Ms. Peggy Burns,
who spoke about transportation technologies
and opportunities available for engineers, of
which students may not already be largely
exposed. These events provided a new perspective on engineering and business opportunities
and ways to approach them in the industry.

Students listen attentively to Mr. Raj Subramanyam about success in a corporate career

Moreover, the term was dedicated to planning

more exciting events for the upcoming winter
term, and as always any ideas from our members are always welcome!

networking committee

SWE members show off their

fabulous crafts

Mentor & Mentee craft night!

With the start of the school year, means the

start of Drexel SWEs Freshman Mentorship
Program. Twenty -two freshman engineering
and technical science girls were paired with
returning female engineering students. The
goal is to provide each girl with a mentor early
on in her college career, who will guide her on
the right path in becoming a strong and confi-

dent engineer. We have had two successful

Mentor-Mentee events- a Game Night and
Craft Night. In October, our mentors and
mentees enjoyed an entertaining Game Night,
where we played apples to apples, taboo, and
several rounds of mafia. This was accompanied
by a delicious dinner consisting of Chipotle
catering.
3

fall 2015
networking committee (contd)
In November, they showed their creativity
through our Craft Night, where they painted
and decorated frames. There was also pizza
and salad for dinner. We would like to thank all
the mentors and mentees who were able to
attend these events and make them successful.

If you are a freshman or transfer student and

would like to be a mentee for the 2015-2016
SWE Freshman Mentorship Program, please
visit the Mentorship page on the Drexel SWE
Website.

outreach committee
The Outreach committee hosted two events
this past Fall term to promote STEM for
middle school aged girls. The first event,
Programming in Python, was hosted by SWE
volunteers; it introduced six girls from diverse
academic backgrounds to simple programming
basics, including: data types, loops, strings,
and if statements. The second event, the

STEMtacular Fair, was held later in the term.

Ten girls, which included many participants
from the first event, learned about science and
math through different demos, which included:
making the best aluminum boat, crosslinking
borax and glue, and creating bristle bots out of
toothbrush heads and motors to name a few.

Various pictures from outreach events from Programming in Python and STEMtacular Fair
4

fall 2015
Welness committee
During the fall term, Wellness kept busy with
continuing old events and also trying new
events. We continued the Saved Me dog
shelter visits! We take a group of girls to a dog
shelter for an hour or two hours and help walk
the dogs, play with the dogs, and take care of
them in whatever way is needed. This helps
girls get their minds off of school for a little and
also involve them in community service. We
also continued our Finals SWEek Massages
event. This event brings three professional
masseuses to Drexel and allows for women
engineers to get a free massage before they
have to start studying for finals! A new event
was hosted by Drexel called Meditation in
Challenging Times. We encouraged our SWE
members to attend this lecture by Amy Edelstein. She trained at the Dalai Lamas monastery in India and teaches that mindfulness
practices are foundational inner strength
training techniques. A new idea the Wellness
Committee tried was getting a group of members to go to a Drexel Group Exercise Class that
was out of the ordinary. Lexi, Wellness Director, was a first-timer going to these classes and
encouraged ten first-timer girls to join her in

going to these exercise classes. The group of 20

tried Cardio Dance which was a zumba with
current music and also a Power Yoga which
was a strengthening and more cardio intensive
yoga. Let us know of any mentally and/or
physically healthy events you would like us to
organize for you!

Cardio Dance class!

Group photo after an empowering power yoga class

5

fall 2015
Drexel sweet summit
Drexel University hosted the Region E SWEet
Collegiate Leadership Summit, which was an
enriching, valuable, and fun experience! The
SWEet Summit is an event where collegiate
sections learn various professional development and leadership skills. It is a fantastic
networking opportunity! Attendees from
Drexel University, Rowan University, Widener
University, and Temple University were present and got to network with one another and
learn more about how their individual collegiate sections work. Tips and tricks were
shared with one another in order to improve
section organization. One of the objectives of
SWEet summits is to increase engagement of
collegiate sections & leaders. Claire Dvorak, a
Collegiate Leadership Coach, shared many
valuable lessons and engaged us with interesting activities including personality tests. We

hope this event benefitted all attendees and we

are looking forward to the next SWEet
Summit!

part ii
we15 national conference
october 22-24, 2015
nashville, tn
6

National conference
conference attendees

Sam Schneider

Shravani Birewar

Jacque Tawney

Danielle Schroeder

Jasmin Patel

Maissoun Ksara

Bhavika Gali

Angeline Aguinaldo

Meera Varshneya

Madison Kierod

Lexi Kapusta

National conference
Experience blurbs

Jacque Tawney

My first national SWE conference was so memorable. First of all, I

love all SWE girls. Bonding with my section and branching out to
meet girls from all over the country was amazing. Nashville was
amazing! I really enjoyed the collegiate luncheon, although as a
vegan, Id appreciate more substantial food (like beans or tofu something with protein). But that was my only complaint all weekend! The workshops were interesting and informative, particularly
the ones focusing on mediation, women in NASA, and struggles of
women of color in STEM. These workshops opened my eyes to new
perspectives I would have never seen on my own. I am so thankful
for that.
The career fair influenced me to consider grad school. I really didnt
think that would be my path, but now I see that there are so many
factors making me want to go! This revelation made me cry because I
was feeling so lost, but this is an option that would bring me a lot of
joy and fulfilment, possibly for free. Im not sure where my mind will
be in a year, but I know Ill be at the next SWE conference finding
connections, opportunities, friends, answers, inspiration, and meaningful knowledge.

The National SWE Conference exceeded my expectations. From

being in Nashville for the first time to meeting the CEO of Kellogs to
buying my first cowboy boots and scoring a potential full time job,
the weekend was jam packed. At the career fair there had to have
been over 500 companies and thankfully my current company,
Turner Construction, was there and extended a full time job offer to
me to work for them in Nashville instead of Philadelphia. I loved
downtown Nashville, the live country music, cowboy boots, barbeque
food, and the southern hospitality. Getting pep talks from many
women CEOs inspired me to one day maybe become an Executive
member of a company myself! Bonding with girls from my Drexel
section was memorable. However, we made many friends there
including collegiates and professionals from across the country.
Experiencing thousands of women together for a national engineering conference was one of my favorite experiences in my life so far.

Lexi Kapusta

National conference
Experience blurbs

Madison Kierod

The one session that stood out a lot to me was the "milk
and methane" lightning talk.. This was particularly
interesting to me for a number of reasons...
1) The woman who spoke worked for caterpillar, and
their technology that breaks down cow poop into fuel is a
large-scale version of the same thing a farmer in costa
rica used during a trip I took to Costa Rica my freshman
year. It was awesome to see this applied in totally different situations and parts of the world.
2) Methane/meat industry pollution is something I am
particularly interested in and was inspired to continue to
look into this not just as a personal concern but as an
engineering dilemma that i could possibly help solve.
3) My 1st co-op worked with a similar technology to the
cow-poop-to-fuel-machine... Except the machine I
worked on used woodchips and produced oil. Again, very
cool to see that what I am doing now can and will be
relevant in my future.

I had a wonderful time at the SWE National Conference in

Nashville, TN. As my first national conference attendance, I
was amazed to see so many female engineers and learn about
their experiences as a collegiate member. I had a great time
attending workshops and luncheons, volunteering, and
browsing through the career fair. My favorite workshop was
the Im Perfect, Why Isnt Everyone Else Around Me. As a
person who tends to look at these details, this was a very
enlightening talk. I learned the importance of accepting that
all situations in life cannot be perfect and inducing these
unnecessary stresses to make them perfect is not healthy or
required. Previously, I used to pick at ways that my friends
performed tasks such as washing the dishes or decorating an
image. Now when I look at this from a clearer perspective, I
have realized the beauty in others approaches. Additionally, I
really enjoyed the career fair. Never had I seen such a grand
fair with numerous companies and schools. It really helped
me network and practice speaking with potential employers.
Overall, I had a great experience and look forward to attending these in the future as an alumna.
8

Meera Varshneya

National conference
Career fair
The annual WE Career Fair is one of the largest
in the world, drawing together more than 300+
employers, recruiters, and program directors to
hire the next generation of engineers. This
year, names such as Northrop Grumman, IBM,
Intel, and ExxonMobil for two days of intensive
recruitment, though the process began long
anyone arrived at Nashville, TN. Months before
the conference, Drexel SWE attendees prepared with resume critiques and company
research, utilizing the online SWE career portal
and resume upload tool. By doing so, their
resumes directly reached employers, driving a
few to set up on-site interviews with Drexel
attendees at the conference. Many other
attendees secured interviews for both full-time
and co-op positions while at the career fair,
resulting in two job offers within the group!
Aside from employment, the WE Career Fair
benefits attendees by immersing them in professional networking. In seeing the thousands
of other competent candidates at the Fair,
attendees are motivated to define their employee excellence and compete for highly valuable

positions. Three Drexel attendees experienced

this first-hand in receiving invitations to attend
corporate dinners, while others learned how to
expertly navigate conversations with recruiters
before beginning the Drexel co-op A-round.
The WE Career Fair is an annual highlight at
the SWE National Conference and one that
remains a productive, rewarding experience for
Drexel SWE each year.

WE15 Career Fair

(photo courtesey of SWE)

As a first time attendee to a SWE National Conference, I was fascinated by how

many companies were there to support women in engineering and provide
fantastic opportunities for both collegiates and professionals. I was really
excited to network with some companies and was also offered on site interviews. The career fair was one of my favorite parts about WE15, and it allowed
me to narrow down the spectrum of companies I am interested in. The free
swag was also pretty SWEet!
Maissoun Ksara

The career fair was amazing! I spoke to a lot of representatives that were interested in me and I am following through with them for possible co-op positions.
I also learned a lot about companies that I never heard of, and companies that I
never considered to be an engineering opportunities.

Madison Kierod

National conference
SWEFL & Collegiate leadership institute
The SWE Future Leaders (SWEFL) program
started in 2006 to improve the pipeline of
collegiate leaders. Individuals are nominated
for participation in the SWEFL program and,
when selected, attend the annual Collegiate
Leadership Institute (CLI). At CLI, SWEFLs
receive training on both SWE and leadership
topics, such as business etiquette, personal
brand, and communication. SWEFLs also have
the opportunity to network with collegiate and
professional members from across the country.
Maissoun Ksara, Public Relations Director of
Drexel SWE, was 1 of the 22 girls selected from
across the country for this honor of SWEFL
FY16. Danielle Schroeder, Vice President of
Drexel SWE and also the FY16 Region E RCCE
also had the opportunity to attend CLI.

The Collegiate Leadership Institute at WE15 in

Nashville was such an enriching experience, as
it included talks and interactive workshops by
various speakers on topics like how to communicate effectively and finding our leadership
brands. During the three days at CLI, one of
the most prominent speakers was Erica
Dhawan. Erica is the Founder & CEO of Cotential, a global consultancy that accelerates the
connectedness of employees teams, customers
and clients. She spoke on global stages ranging
from the World Economic Forum at Davos to
companies such as FedEx, PepsiCo, and
McGraw Hill Financial. She is also the co-author of Get Big Things Done: The Power of
Connectional Intelligence. Overall, CLI is a
great opportunity to improve your leadership
skills!

FY16 SWEFLs Group Photo!

10

National conference
Women defining the future luncheon

Northrop Gumman representatives

On Saturday, attendees attended the Women

Defining the Future Collegiate Leadership
Luncheon, sponsored by Northrop Grumman.
At each table, a Northrop Grumman engineer
sits and networks with the collegiate attendees. Collegiate attendees are randomly
dispersed throughout the tables, allowing them
to meet students from other colleges and share

(photo courtesey of NDSU SWE)

best practices from their sections. During the

lunch, several Northrop Grumman engineers
were on a panel, offer advice regarding their
career pathway and answering questions from
attendees. Many attendees asked various questions about transitioning into a professional
setting.

Awards & recognitions

For the third year in a row, Drexel SWE was
honored to be presented the Oustanding Collegiate Section - Gold Award! The Drexel SWE
secion worked really hard this year to continue
hosting professional development, networking,
outreach, and membership events which
strengthened the section and our skills. We are
looking forward to another year of more hard
work and fantastic outcomes! Furthermore,
Danielle Schroeder, Vice President of Drexel
SWE, along with Lenora Dieyi, member of
Drexel SWE, were recipients of SWE scholarships. We are very proud of them and enoucourage more members to apply to SWE scholarships!

Outstanding Collegiate Section - Gold Award at We15!

11

National conference
Celebrate SWE! & closing keynote
On Saturday night, conference attendees
donned their best, some wearing ball gowns,
most sticking to semi formal attire. Over
dinner, attendees celebrated SWE achievements including winners of collegiate competitions, professional section awards, collegiate
section awards, the hosting section for next
years conference, society updates, and a closing keynote. The closing keynote was given by
Maria Fernanda Mejia, a recognized global
leader who was named one of the 50 most
powerful women in Mexico. Mrs. Mejia shared

her perspective and experiences on her professional career path to become a global leader.
Drexel SWE attendees bit their nails, hoping
that their hardwork and dedication would
result in winning one of the prestigious collegiate awards. Their efforts were not for
nought as the section was recognized as a Gold
Level- Outstanding section for the third year in
a row. Samantha Schneider, accepted the
award from President Colleen Layman on
behalf of the Drexel section.

12

A special thank you to our sponsors!

Your contributions help us inspire women in engineering!

Executive board
President
Vice President
Secretary
Treasurer
Networking Director
Outreach Director
Membership Director
Professional Development Director
Wellness Director
Public Relations Director
Conference Director
Professional Development Chair
Professional Development Chair
Treasurer Chair
Treasurer Chair
Social Media Chair
Website Chair
Historian Chair
Networking Chair
Wellness Chair

Samantha Schneider
Danielle Schroeder
Angeline Aguinaldo
Madison Keirod
Meera Vershneya
Neha Thomas
Maureen Burnside
Bhavika Gali
Alexandria Kapusta
Maissoun Ksara
Jasmin Patel
Shravani Birewar
Soumya Iyer
Lenora Dieyi
Rania Mina
Ridhima Phukan
Karishma Changlani
Samantha Cassel
Jacque Tawney
Elisabeth Wegner
13