Annika Viswesh - Inspiring Students in STEM
JoT has grown and served many underrepresented students not only in California (Ravenswood Middle School in East Palo Alto and Crittenden Middle School in Mountain View) but New York, Zimbabwe, Ghana, South Africa, Haiti, India, and the United Kingdom. It has impacted over 6200 students through live presentations and webinars worldwide.
I ran a STEM education seminar in India on Aug 22, 2020, and live-streamed the event on youtube. Leading practitioners in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math shared their personal perspectives and career journeys in their areas of specialization. Also, students and teachers from schools and universities from the US and India shared their thoughts on staying focused on STEM education during the lockdown. Over 1000 students tuned in live to listen to the seminar.
Jobs of Tomorrow was honored to support African Science Buskers Festival. I was fortunate to connect with passionate, inspiring, and accomplished professionals, Dr. Elizabeth Ofili, Dr. Iris R. Wagstaff, Ph.D., Dr. Raja (Puragra) GuhaThakurta, Dr. Jo Boaler, Dr. Patricia Silveyra, and Shreyansh Daftry was able to introduce them to Knowledge Chikundi, the founder of the African Science Buskers Festival. On Aug 29, 2020, at the festival, they presented to over 5000 students across the African continent about their STEM journey and interests. Thank you for empowering young students to make a positive change in the world through scientific discovery and innovation! The event was broadcast live via Youtube.
I also ran a workshop on AI in Healthcare at the festival.
Here is what Dr. Ofili (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Ofili) sent to me over email "Would like to collaborate with you and Annika, and hope we can discuss potential opportunities after the festival."
Here are some of my JoT related postings on Linkedin and feedback (please go through the comments from everyone to see their feedback).
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6705340225729777664/
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6703894535346507776/
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6686473387767939072/
You can also find the videos of the events on my website:
https://www.jobsoftomorrow.org/webinars (scroll all the way to the bottom to see the African Science Buskers event).
In collaboration with professionals from the STEM fields, I hope that we can increase diversity and equity in STEM careers. My journey with JoT has been both enriching and humbling. Especially how we got over difficulties in the different sites from no access to video in Zimbabwe to hurricane Isaias in Haiti to the language barrier to many other problems. Every opportunity was a learning experience in how to overcome problems in order to effectively run the program with whatever technology was available.