MakeHer Mentor: Teaching local girls about coding

SAVANNAH, GA (WTOC) - By Wendi Redman, Anchor
Some local girls are making their marks in science and math.

MakeHer Mentor is a group of six through eighth-grade girls who get together after school to learn all about coding. 

"This is our cap stone activity for MakeHer Mentor Georgia Tech. We are encouraging girls in sixth, seventh, and eighth grades to consider engineering," Said Carolyn Perry, MakeHer Mentor Program Director.

Perry says the STEM Academy girls meet for six weekly sessions. 

"We created musical compositions with computer coding. We give them hands-on activities in computer science," she said.

The program focuses on girls to help level the playing field when it comes to engineering.

"Overall, girls represent about one out of every three future engineers, and we'd really like to see that move more toward 50 percent," said Perry.

Lily Harris is one of the students in the program.

"It's cool and I like how it shows how track numbers can also be coded. I think it's cool how it does that," said the 6th grader.  "I've had an interest in math since I was in the second grade."

Perry says it's important to get the girls interested at a young age.

"That way they're encouraged to take the right steps to get a schedule that includes calculus and physics."

MakeHer Mentor is a collaborative initiative between HV Jenkins School of Engineering, STEM Academy at Bartlett, and Georgia Tech’s Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing.

They hope to expand the program in the future to include more middle schools.

http://www.wtoc.com/story/34239235/makeher-mentor-teaching-local-girls-about-coding

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