By Heather Doty
Heather is the Director of Regions on the Board of Directors for the Society of Women Engineers and is an active and contributing SWE RMS member.
In March I participated in SWE’s Congressional Outreach: “Diversity & Inclusion Fuels Innovation in STEM.” SWE leads the effort for this visit day, but over 30 other professional organizations are also invited to participate.
The event began with a training session on Wednesday afternoon, where we learned about current public policy issues related to women in STEM, and also heard from a panel of congressional staffers about their roles and how to approach our meetings. We followed this with role-plays in the small groups we were assigned to for our visits. I was joined by a professor from Colorado School of Mines who was representing AIME and one of the board members of the National Academy of Engineering who lives in Highlands Ranch.
Wednesday evening we attended a reception at the Rayburn House Office Building, where several members of the House stopped by to address the group including Donna Edwards of Maryland, Paul Tonko of New York, and Dan Lipinski of Illinois. Staffers from other offices were also in attendance.
The following morning we did further role playing prior to our visits, and also got a special presentation from Christine Merdon, a civil engineer and COO for the Architect of the Capitol on the restoration work underway. Later in the day between office visits we also got a tour of the US Capitol.
We had appointments with staff from the offices of Senator Cory Gardner, Representative Ed Perlmutter, and Representative Jared Polis. There we shared some of the talking points from SWE’s advocacy efforts including a push for funding for Title IV of the Every Student Succeeds Act and reauthorization of the America CMPETES act. I also shared highlights of our Rocky Mountain Section activities including hosting the recent region conference and our annual GESTEM event.
If you're interested in learning more about SWE's efforts in public policy, you can visit the Legislative Action Center.
Heather is the Director of Regions on the Board of Directors for the Society of Women Engineers and is an active and contributing SWE RMS member.
In March I participated in SWE’s Congressional Outreach: “Diversity & Inclusion Fuels Innovation in STEM.” SWE leads the effort for this visit day, but over 30 other professional organizations are also invited to participate.
The event began with a training session on Wednesday afternoon, where we learned about current public policy issues related to women in STEM, and also heard from a panel of congressional staffers about their roles and how to approach our meetings. We followed this with role-plays in the small groups we were assigned to for our visits. I was joined by a professor from Colorado School of Mines who was representing AIME and one of the board members of the National Academy of Engineering who lives in Highlands Ranch.
Wednesday evening we attended a reception at the Rayburn House Office Building, where several members of the House stopped by to address the group including Donna Edwards of Maryland, Paul Tonko of New York, and Dan Lipinski of Illinois. Staffers from other offices were also in attendance.
The following morning we did further role playing prior to our visits, and also got a special presentation from Christine Merdon, a civil engineer and COO for the Architect of the Capitol on the restoration work underway. Later in the day between office visits we also got a tour of the US Capitol.
We had appointments with staff from the offices of Senator Cory Gardner, Representative Ed Perlmutter, and Representative Jared Polis. There we shared some of the talking points from SWE’s advocacy efforts including a push for funding for Title IV of the Every Student Succeeds Act and reauthorization of the America CMPETES act. I also shared highlights of our Rocky Mountain Section activities including hosting the recent region conference and our annual GESTEM event.
If you're interested in learning more about SWE's efforts in public policy, you can visit the Legislative Action Center.
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