![“[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)
Fifth annual Girls Programming League Challenge offers new coding opportunities
Panelists Aleks Goeva, Johanna Kim, Anita Chetty and Dr. Natalie Pageler, all female industry professionals working in the fields of medicine or computer science, speak to Girls Programming League Challenge participants. The panelists discussed their experiences as women in the fields of computer science and medicine.
October 7, 2022
Competing against the clock, upper and middle school students from across the nation participated in the Girls Programming League (GPL) Challenge, solving coding problems and hearing from a panel of expert speakers on Sept. 25.
Now the fifth annual GPL Challenge since its inception in 2018, this year’s event took place virtually on Zoom to over 100 female-identifying student attendees. The event was organized and prepared by the Programming Club.
With two separate divisions to accommodate both novice and advanced programmers, the event started with a two-hour coding competition, where students competed for top monetary awards. Held on the CodeForces contest platform, the competition required coders to apply their knowledge of algorithms to efficiently solve word problems and write programs that respond with the correct output given certain inputs.
“My favorite part was actually after the competition was over,” Tanisha Singh (11), who competed in the advanced division, said. “Because then, my friends and I were able to relax without any of the time pressure, discuss solutions or what we had overlooked in the competition, or potential practice strategies for the future.”
After the main event, competitors listened to a keynote speech from Dr. Maria Nattestad, a senior software engineer at Google Health, about her journey from studying biology and medicine to computer science and her experience as a woman in the field of bioinformatics, building algorithms and tools for processing genomic data.
“The keynote speaker changed my view on computer science,” said Tiffany Zhu (9) after listening to Dr. Nattestad speak about her career path in biology and computer science. “I thought that was inspiring, that even though it took her a while to find it, in the end, she got to find her passion.”
In the afternoon, students listened to Dr. Natalie Pageler, Clinical Professor of Pediatric Critical Care at Stanford University; Aleks Goeva, a researcher at the Broad Institute of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Harvard University; Johanna Kim, Executive Director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence in Medicine and Imaging at Stanford University; and Harker’s own Anita Chetty discuss women in the field of computer science and medicine and the technical details of their respective fields.
“It was really fun,” said Aashvi Ravi (9). “Each of them spoke about their experiences and everyone got to ask some questions.”
Following the one-hour panel discussion, the Programming Club officers led the awards ceremony, congratulating the top teams and awarding monetary prizes to the top four teams from each division.
Upper school computer science teacher Anu Datar, co-advisor to Programming Club, first became involved in the competition three years ago when she saw the event’s success.
I thought it was important to encourage girls, especially young girls [and] high school students, to try and explore what they could do with computer science,” she said. “I enjoy everything that they do, including the contest and the panel speakers.”
