Introducing Imagine Your STEM Future: Supporting High School Girls’ Entry and Persistence into STEM

Research shows that interaction with female STEM mentors plays an important role in helping girls develop a positive STEM identity that supports interest and persistence within the STEM fields. The Imagine Your STEM Future Program does just that — by pairing female engineers at Raytheon and University of Arizona female undergraduate student mentors with high school girls at Desert View High School. Mentors are asked to commit to an entire school year, with most visiting the same class weekly or every other week. Due to the frequency of the visits and the large class size, the Raytheon and University of Arizona interaction with the young women is a hybrid of mentorship, with emphasis on relationship-building and meaningful conversations, and a role model—someone girls can look up to and whose footsteps they can aspire to follow. The Imagine Your STEM Future lessons are integrated into the school day, and take place 4 days per week as part of their college and career preparation curriculum. Any given lesson is a combination of hands-on STEM activities, reflective group conversations, or role model videos or visits. Each element of the program has been chosen based on best practices for maximizing impact on girls’ interest and persistence in STEM. Through implementing the engineering design process, girls begin to build STEM skills such as designing, building, and prototyping, but more importantly for this program, learn communication and collaboration skills as they work in small groups. At the Women in Science and Engineering Program, we are thrilled to partner with Raytheon on this important program that aims to foster both gender and racial equity as well as a sense of belonging within the STEM fields! We are looking forward to returning to the classroom and providing in-person programming in August 202