![“[Building nerf blasters] became this outlet of creativity for me that hasn't been matched by anything else. The process [of] making a build complete to your desire is such a painstakingly difficult process, but I've had to learn from [the skills needed from] soldering to proper painting. There's so many different options for everything, if you think about it, it exists. The best part is [that] if it doesn't exist, you can build it yourself," Ishaan Parate said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/DSC_8149-900x604.jpg)
![“When I came into high school, I was ready to be a follower. But DECA was a game changer for me. It helped me overcome my fear of public speaking, and it's played such a major role in who I've become today. To be able to successfully lead a chapter of 150 students, an officer team and be one of the upperclassmen I once really admired is something I'm [really] proud of,” Anvitha Tummala ('21) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-25-at-9.50.05-AM-900x594.png)
![“I think getting up in the morning and having a sense of purpose [is exciting]. I think without a certain amount of drive, life is kind of obsolete and mundane, and I think having that every single day is what makes each day unique and kind of makes life exciting,” Neymika Jain (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Screen-Shot-2017-06-03-at-4.54.16-PM.png)
![“My slogan is ‘slow feet, don’t eat, and I’m hungry.’ You need to run fast to get where you are–you aren't going to get those championships if you aren't fast,” Angel Cervantes (12) said. “I want to do well in school on my tests and in track and win championships for my team. I live by that, [and] I can do that anywhere: in the classroom or on the field.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/DSC5146-900x601.jpg)
![“[Volleyball has] taught me how to fall correctly, and another thing it taught is that you don’t have to be the best at something to be good at it. If you just hit the ball in a smart way, then it still scores points and you’re good at it. You could be a background player and still make a much bigger impact on the team than you would think,” Anya Gert (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AnnaGert_JinTuan_HoHPhotoEdited-600x900.jpeg)
![“I'm not nearly there yet, but [my confidence has] definitely been getting better since I was pretty shy and timid coming into Harker my freshman year. I know that there's a lot of people that are really confident in what they do, and I really admire them. Everyone's so driven and that has really pushed me to kind of try to find my own place in high school and be more confident,” Alyssa Huang (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AlyssaHuang_EmilyChen_HoHPhoto-900x749.jpeg)
WiSTEM holds club week
University of California, San Francisco Marina Sirota shares a UCSF postdoctoral scholar’s thoughts on women in STEM. Aside from hosting Sirota on Friday, WiSTEM also screened the movie “Queen of Katwe” on Wednesday for their club week this week.
November 17, 2017
The Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (WiSTEM) club hosted its club week this week, utilizing a variety of events and fundraising activities to promote female involvement in STEM fields.
“We really want to support women who don’t necessarily have the opportunities that are afforded to people at Harker,” treasurer Emily Chen (12) said. “By doing that through a venue that the Harker community supports, we are able to give them different educational opportunities and careers beyond what they might have been told of.”
Club officers sold Fantasia pearl milk tea for $6 and homemade brownies for $2 throughout the week in front of Manzanita to raise funds for the Women’s Institute of Secondary Education & Research (WISER), a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing healthcare and education to girls in rural Kenya.
“WISER is a school in Africa in a rural area where girls often don’t get the chance to even have a chance for education, but WISER encourages leadership in the community and involvement as well as academics,” vice president Anooshree Sengupta (12) said. “From our fundraiser sales, we’re actually funding a girl’s tuition for the entire year.”
Additionally, club members invited students to attend several events, including a screening of the movie “Queen of Katwe” on Wednesday and a lecture by University of California, San Francisco professor Marina Sirota on computational drug discovery on Friday.
“Queen of Katwe,” an hour-long biographical film, tells the story of Phiona Mutesi, a Ugandan woman from the slum of Katwe who learned to play chess as a girl and eventually represented Uganda in the World Chess Championship. Mutesi went on to become one of the first titled female chess players in Ugandan history.
On Friday, club officers arranged for Sirota to give a talk on her research in precision medicine, a field of genetic research that attempts to optimize the benefits of treatments to specific groups of patients based on their genetic characteristics. In her speech, Sirota gave an introduction to bioinformatics research and shared her excitement surrounding new developments in the field.
“[An] area that I think will grow immensely is analysis of clinical data, like electronic medical records,” Sirota said. “When you go to the doctor, all of the diagnoses, all of the blood tests, everything that happens to a patient, is recorded in a database. Now, informatics researchers are starting to use that data to build computational predictive models. Then, putting [integrations of] different molecular data analysis methods … together with clinical data is really going to move the needle.”
WiSTEM will continue to host STEM-related events around school, such as the annual Research Symposium, while promoting other events that expose girls to STEM, such as its STEM Buddies sessions with Harker preschoolers.
