Greetings,

Dear FSA Community,

One aspect of our school that I love very much is the school culture we have built together. In my eyes, we are one united and caring community where our differences respected, accepted, and cherished.

We have created this diversity and inclusion blog for our school for two purposes:

• Share helpful articles, quotes, and videos about the topics of diversity and inclusion
• Celebrate our diversity at Fulton Science Academy

Best,

Kenan Sener, Principal

Diversity and Inclusion Video: Inspiring the next generation of female engineers

Close your eyes and picture and engineer. You probably weren't envisioning Debbie Sterling. Debbie Sterling is an engineer and founder of GoldieBlox, a toy company out to inspire the next generation of female engineers. She has made it her mission in life to tackle the gender gap in science, technology, engineering and math.

GoldieBlox is a book series+construction set that engages kids to build through the story of Goldie, the girl inventor who solves problems by building simple machines. Debbie writes and illustrates Goldie's stories, taking inspiration from her grandmother, one of the first female cartoonists and creator of ""Mr. Magoo."" Her company, launched in 2012, raised over $285,000 in 30 days through Kickstarter, and has been featured in numerous publications such as The Atlantic and Forbes.

Prior to founding GoldieBlox, Debbie served as the Marketing Director of Lori Bonn, a national jewelry company. For the past 7 years, she has also served as a brand strategy consultant for a wide variety of organizations including Microsoft, T-Mobile, Organic Valley and the New York Knicks.

Debbie's inspiration to create a mission-driven company came in 2008, when she spent 6 months volunteering at a grassroots nonprofit in rural India. She created a viral fundraising campaign called ""I Want a Goat,"" raising over $30,000 for economic and educational development in the region. This experience helped pave the way to finding her true passion: inspiring the next generation of female engineers.

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Creating an Identity-Safe Classroom

Identity-safe classrooms foster belonging and value for students of all backgrounds. Because social identity affects students' experiences, identity-safe teaching can help students become successful learners.

To read more, please visit: https://www.edutopia.org/blog/creating-an-identity-safe-classroom-becki-cohn-vargas-dorothy-steele

FSA Success Stories

This summer three of our middle school female students attended 2018 National Invention Convention and Enterpreneurship Expo in Missouri with their "Water Heater Sensor" project and have won three awards there!

Smart Home Technology Award in Industry Category by Carrier Company.

CAD Award in Speciality Category by Autodesk Company

Patent Application Award by Wilmerhale Company.

This is our school's first patent application for the projects developed under our STEAM Enrichment Projects Program! 

These wonderful students were interviewed by CBS television yesterday.

Congratulations to Ariana, Sarayu, Sophia, their parents, and our wonderful coach Mr. Kaya for this great achievement! 

Let's not forget that #girlsrock

Way to go! #girlpower

The Role of Education In Advancing a Diversity and Inclusion Breakthrough

The process to become an inclusive leader doesn’t start when a grown person enters into the business world. No, indeed it starts much earlier. It starts at the childhood stage and must be nurtured throughout the formative educational years. If we really want to accelerate equality in our society we all need to challenge ourselves to understand what biases we are passing on to our children. Children are not born with bias. They learn bias. The hard brain wiring contributes to the way any of us processes information, but it is the family that influences us the most as we develop, followed by our experience in the school system. Teachers at every level including the collegiate level must partner with parents to sow the seeds to produce citizens that believe in equality. This is not to let corporate America off the hook but rather to propose a collaborative effort between the individual, parents, teachers and business leaders.

Please visit this website to read more: https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/the-role-of-education-in-advancing-a-diversity-and_us_5a556ad1e4b0baa6abf16267

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Why Gender Equality In The Workplace Is Not Enough

Most organizations recognize the benefits of having a gender diverse workplace in the modern economy—equal hiring practices lead to higher engagement, more creativity, and better talent recruitment. But are there benefits that go beyond equal numbers of men, women, and gender-diverse people in the room?

Londa Schiebinger, a Professor of History of Science at Stanford and Director of the Gender Innovations in Science, Health & Medicine, Engineering, and Environment Project, has a unique take on this question. She points out that in business and industry, “gender variables” are all about spurring creativity and innovation; but in science, gender variables can mean the difference between life and death. Her research has led to the development of numerous case studieshighlighting innovation gaps due to lack of gender insight. She cites three of these examples:

Please click here to read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/amyblankson/2018/04/03/why-gender-equality-in-the-workplace-is-not-enough/#123c8cd23585

Diversity and Inclusion Videos: The Danger of a Single Story

Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.

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FSA Success Stories

An alarming shortage of females in STEAM careers (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) remains a timely and trending news topic as companies in this rapidly growing sector clamor to narrow the gender gap. According to the National Science Foundation, women currently comprise less than 25% of STEAM-related jobs, and less than 2% are females from under-represented minorities.

It is for this reason that heads turned when it was announced that the first team ever to represent the state of Georgia at the International FLL Robotics Open Championship this summer is a team of ALL GIRLS! Eighth-grade girls, to be exact, all of whom are students at Fulton Science Academy Private School in Alpharetta, GA. 

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Diversity and Inclusion Videos:How diversity makes teams more innovative

Are diverse companies really more innovative? Rocío Lorenzo and her team surveyed 171 companies to find out -- and the answer was a clear yes. In a talk that will help you build a better, more robust company, Lorenzo dives into the data and explains how your company can start producing fresher, more creative *ideas* by treating diversity as a competitive advantage.

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Diversity and Inclusion Videos: Inclusion, Exclusion, Illusion and Collusion

CEO of Human Facets, Helen has a 25+ year successful track record in the field of Global Inclusion. She is an internationally recognized Thought Leader on Unconscious Bias, global inclusion and diversity. As creator of "Cognizant" -- Unconscious Bias assessment tool and the "ISM Profile" for measuring Inclusion Skills gaps, her work has contributed to clients winning the Catalyst Award for Gender improvements. Helen is passionate about Inclusion work and relaxes by watching and playing golf.

How to involve more women and girls in engineering

As millions of students of all ages return to school this fall, they are making important choices that have a strong influence on their eventual career path – which college majors to pursue, which high school classes to take, even which elementary school extracurricular activities to join. Many of them – especially women, girls and members of minority groups – make choices that lead them away from professions in the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Women are just 13 percent of mechanical engineering undergraduate students. And women earn only 14.2 percent of doctorate degrees in mechanical engineering. More broadly, women make up 49 percent of the college-educated workforce, but only 14 percent of practicing engineers nationwide.

Please click visit this website to read more: http://theconversation.com/how-to-involve-more-women-and-girls-in-engineering-55794

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Diversity and Inclusion Video: Short Film

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Creating a Successful Workplace Diversity Program

Companies today spend millions of dollars on workplace diversity programs and outreach, often with little to show for it. Research has found that most workplace diversity programs fail to produce meaningful diversity and inclusion, and some have actually increased bias among individual employees. In STEM fields, both the private and public sectors continue to struggle with recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce. As of 2017, nearly 75% of those in computing and mathematical fields were men and fewer than 15% were black or Hispanic. 

Please this website to read more: https://hbr.org/2018/03/5-things-we-learned-about-creating-a-successful-workplace-diversity-program

Diversity and Inclusion Video:

Prudence L. Carter is a professor of education and faculty director of the John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities at Stanford. Her expertise includes issues of youth identity and race, class and gender; urban poverty; social and cultural inequality; and the sociology of education. She is the author of the awardwinning Keepin' It Real: School Success beyond Black and White (2005); Stubborn Roots: Race, Culture, and Inequality in U.S. and South African Schools (2012); and co-editor of Closing the Opportunity Gap: What America Must Do to Give Every Child an Even Chance (2013), all published by Oxford University Press.

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Pictures from FSA Cultural Cafe

Diversity and Inclusion Video: Apple Company

At Apple, “open” isn’t just a word. It’s our culture. One that embraces faiths, disabilities, races, ages, ideologies, personalities, and differences. Because humanity isn’t singular. It’s plural.

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Diversity and Inclusion Video: Short Film about Identity

Living in a world where everybody wears masks due to lack of self-identity, a brave girl encounters the truth that sets her free.

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