Technovation for Girls

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Technovation for Girls

Girls for a Change.

Girls are on the cutting edge of using STEM to create a more sustainable & equitable future!

Meenakshi's
Journey with Technovation

Ever since I was a young girl, I have always been drawn to technology and its endless possibilities. It was this passion that led me on a remarkable journey with Technovation Girls, an organization dedicated to empowering young girls in the field of technology. Participating in 2021 season ( and winning the Grand Prize !) and volunteering as an ambassador for the last two years helped to shape up my technical , presentation and soft skills.When I first learned about Technovation Girls in 2020, I was immediately captivated by its mission to bridge the gender gap in the tech industry and empower girls to become leaders and innovators.

As a teenager with a deep interest in coding and problem-solving, I knew this was an opportunity I couldn’t miss. I got truly inspired by the stories of other young girls and solidified my determination to pursue a career in technology and make a difference in the world. Under the guidance of Technovation Girls and the mentorship I received, I embarked on a project that aimed to help small businesses to reopen safely after Covid 19 pandemic. Even after one full year into the pandemic, there was still no end in sight with new outbreaks in places like India. Businesses were struggling to determine how to balance safety and livelihoods. My team and I studied this problem and realized that one way to help was through better awareness of ventilation.

After talking with several world-renowned experts, we learned that CO2 levels are a simple and easy-to-detect proxy for ventilation.

We built CO2 Sensei, an iPhone app that businesses and individuals can use to measure the CO2 levels around them, understand the difference between safe and unsafe levels, take steps to improve CO2 levels, and track their improvements. We also created a website, https://www.co2sensei.com/, to help users learn more about CO2, ventilation, and COVID-19.Our app was submitted for the Technovation Girls Challenge, and we became the grand prize winner for the 2021 season! From a simple idea that was sparked from the motivation to help small businesses locally, my team and I were able to grow the idea to a patent-pending, award-winning one that will help our community become a safer place for everyone.

After winning the competition, I was eager to help others to gain same life changing experiences I had. I joined the Technovation Ambassador team in 2022 season I get to play a direct role in helping girls discover new possibilities for their futures, whether that’s through teaching at workshops in the San Francisco Bay and Merced area and running information sessions for participants across the world. My journey with Technovation Girls has been a transformative experience, igniting my passion for technology and empowering me to believe in my abilities. As I move forward, I aspire to continue my journey in technology, driving innovation, and making a positive impact. I encourage every young girl with a passion for technology to seize the opportunity that Technovation Girls offers and join the movement of empowered girls shaping the future of technology.

Rhea's Journey with Technovation

Throughout my childhood, I have always been inspired by my parents and the potential of technology in our society. My dad is a computer science engineer, and my mom is a math teacher who went into the teaching sector in pursuit of making a direct impact on the lives of youth although she could have been making way more money in a sector besides education with her technical skill base. Due to my family background, much of my passion projects relate to the fusion of technical skills with a purpose of bettering the community alongside my other interests of business, youth advocacy, and community-based organizing, which eventually helped me come across my Technovation.

In my first year of participating in Technovation, I became a finalist for an app that I worked with a team on, which tackled climate change with a foolproof plan of making a select amount of change within a user’s lifestyle to mitigate their ecological footprint. Moving forward, I then co-founded another app, Z-Waste, that was a food insecurity initiative in schools and then became a Student Ambassador for Technovation where I connected with a variety of aspiring female technology professionals and that is how I connected with Meenakshi and got involved with RisetoAI to empower youth in AI alongside STEM and entrepreneurship. I am currently working with Meenakshi to host more workshops and getting more girls involved within Technovation and AI-related fields.

I have increasingly gotten more involved with Technovation, pitching my apps to corporations for feedback, sharing my story to girls worldwide on Technovation’s platform, and working on the publicity team in Technovation in addition to pitching apps to politicians in my local community. I hope to engage girls with both the technical aspect of AI and the intersections of AI with community-based organizing and entrepreneurship. My aspiration is not only to enhance my own coding skills but also empower youth along the way. All throughout my life, I have been instilled with a principle that you receive what you give, and RisetoAI is a way for me to stay true to my guiding principles to give back to my community.

Mentorship?

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