We are delighted to share about the fabulous success of the STEM Conference (Summer ’21), hosted by STEAMBloom.com during the weekend of Aug 22nd and 23rd. The sessions had four overarching themes: (1) STEM Research (2) Artificial Intelligence and Applications (3) Connecting STEM and Arts and (4) Making STEM More Inclusive.
We had 14 amazing speakers from industry, academia and non-profits. The speakers included
Ms. Kate Kallot (Director of Emerging Areas at NVIDIA; AI & ML Leader; AI4Good Advocate)
Dr. Constance Jeffery (Associate Professor Biological Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago)
Ms. Angela DeHart (Founder & CEO - STEM Impressionists; Advocate for Diversity in STEM)
Ms. Kaitlyn Kuczer (Manager - Deloitte Exponential Tech Experiences & Digital Strategy)
Ms. Haripriya Mehta (Software Engineer at Audible, Inc. - An Amazon Company; MIT '20)
Dr. Kitty Yeung (Creator for Microsoft Quantum Computing; Art by Physicist tech-fashion designer; Comics book author)
Ms. Archika Dogra (Princeton University ’24; Founder @ Innoverge)
Ms. Daniela Andrade (Harvard University ’25; Teens in AI Ambassador; MOSTEC ’20)
Ms. Maria Fields (University of Michigan ‘24; Research Assistant; Regeneron STS Finalist ’20)
Ms. Shinjini Ghosh (MIT ’22; Student Researcher, MIT CS and AI Laboratory)
Mr. Julius Adebayo (MIT - PhD student in CS); Interested in Safe Deployment of ML Systems)
Ms. Mera Seifu (Rising Junior, W.T. Woodson High School)
Ms. Tanisha Dhami (Rising Seniors, Mallya Aditi International School) and
Mr. Pallab Layak (Rising Seniors, Mallya Aditi International School) and
We appreciate their wonderful support of our efforts in driving love for STEM among diverse sections of society. All of them are such inspiring speakers and amazing role models. Here is the link to the conference https://www.steambloom.com/about-1
When we planned the event, we were not sure about the reach. But we were pleasantly surprised…we got an overwhelming response. 1287 high school students registered for the 2-day virtual conference! Besides several students from different states of the US, we had students from 21 countries (Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Colombia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Egypt, Fiji, Hong Kong, India, Ireland, Jamaica, Libya, Morocco, Nepal Pakistan, Sweden, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and Zimbabwe). All continents (except Antarctica) were represented:). It is also worthwhile to note that almost 50% of those who registered were females. They were surely encouraged by our speakers, who are predominantly females (12 out of total 14 speakers).
The feedback from attendees was that the event was planned well, and the learnings from the speakers were insightful. It was surely a fruitful and amazing time for all the attendees. We have uploaded videos of all sessions from the STEM Conference on our website. The link is
We were overwhelmed with several positive outcomes of the STEM Conference:
Encouraged more diversity and inclusion in the field of STEM
Created excitement about STEM field by providing exposure to a variety of topics (STEM Research, Artificial Intelligence and Interdisciplinary STEM and Art learning)
Increased attendees’ knowledge and improved their confidence by hearing personal inspirational stories of diverse speakers about successes in STEM by overcoming struggles.
Allowed attendees to engage and network with leaders and influencers who share a passion for STEM and are role models.
Hosting the STEM Conference has been a truly transformative experience not only in terms of learning and personal growth, but also encouraging us even more to make a difference in the community! We look forward to the next conference in early 2022.
Cheers!
Mehar and Pahal
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