These students shared stories that represent many of us, such as being first in the family to go to college, feeling homesick their first year, and as introverts, having to push themselves outside their comfort zones.

Students of color talked about wishing to see more teachers of color, expressing what we know must improve in terms of multicultural faculty and researcher representation. One student emphasized the importance of balance and staying organized.

To top it off, these amazing young people stressed helping and encouraging others, and being compassionate and empathetic, especially during this time of COVID-19. They offered curriculum advice, such as giving Freshmen preparatory training the summer before starting college, to help them feel less overwhelmed their first year. 

SEAS Dean Lach, who was on the call, expressed how much he had learned, and how much he appreciated the students' willingness to share. And Prof. Shahrokh Ahmadi wrapped up the discussion with the summation of three takeaways: 1) Helping, friendship and community; 2) Diversity, equity and inclusion; 3) How to help students' readiness for college. 

The conversation does not end there - we continue to listen, learn and act to help fulfill the WiE mission of empowering all GW faculty, staff, students and alumni become the best engineers they can be. 

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Giving birth is a common, everyday occurrence and yet, from a bioengineering framework, not much is known about fundamental forces during labor and delivery.

Due to the significant challenges of studying birth in vivo, and because of limited previous analysis, there is a great benefit to building synthetic, simplified models for experiments.

Beginning with the birth canal, we simplify the fetus to a rigid rod and the birth canal to a highly flexible membrane contained in a fluid bath. The next model looks at the uterus as an elastic, fluid-filled sphere and the fetus as a solid ovate. The third model simplifies the cervix to a silicone cylinder with changing mechanical and geometric properties.

With these robust models, we can simulate a variety of labor and delivery scenarios to understand fundamental mechanics and to discover relationships between geometry, birthing fluid properties, and delivery forces. By understanding the biomechanics of late stage labor and delivery, it may be possible to recognize when these mechanics fail, preventing vaginal delivery or causing preterm birth.

Guided by a suggestion by WiE's Advisory Board, WiE reached out to directors of minority-focused STEM organizations regionally, and convened a virtual meeting comprising 11 representatives of initiatives at seven universities. We learned and shared the common and unique aspects of each organization's efforts to not only help women engineers and scientists, but also to ensure diversity and inclusion at our institutions. 

We were joined by leaders from Stony Brook University; Towson University Women in Science Program; University of Maryland Center for Women in Computing; UMBC Center for Women in Technology; Johns Hopkins University; and Howard University.

We compared our various forms of mentoring engagement, which gave us new ideas for growing the WiE mentoring program. These included seniors and juniors mentoring freshmen, student “Ambassadors,” group mentoring, and alumni joining an in-person meeting and hosting tables for students to stop by and speak with them, providing networking a career skills. 

We talked about recruitment and retention of women and minorities in STEM; discussion forums and networking events; awareness programs on diversity and inclusion; ways to integrate the importance of diversity and inclusion into the classroom curriculum; and research in gender studies and research opportunities that are focused on both undergraduate and graduate students.

Most agree that lack of resources and people to do everything they would like to do is a challenge, along with how to merge the silos of various related activities around campus. A common theme was the importance of acknowledging intersectionality, and another was addressing the impact of the pandemic for students as we move beyond this period.