TechGirls from around the world converge on Blacksburg

Phase is SUV, the Tech Girls program. It is a State Department grant administered through legacy International. This is the third iteration of it. So the first three years, it was just young women from North Africa and the Middle East. And now it has gone completely global. So there are girls from South America and Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, and just all over the world. Girls are girls from around the world that want to really embrace their career early and start learning about all things technology and science and stem just broadly. And had this experience this summer where they get to work with other girls, learn leadership and kind of big part of this community to start thinking about what it looks like for them to be in these positions that we're in and be in this college, in the research labs and things like that for their careers down the line. So it is the technology camp. So they are given the choice of four different technology classes, which are all led by Virginia Tech faculty. We've got explore and rivers Python coding, microprocessors. And the fourth one, data analysis and 3D modeling. In addition to the technology class that they take, they are also working on a community service project that they will implement when they get back home. So these are highly selective, really remarkable, very inspiring young women that attend the program. So only three young women from each country actually chosen to participate. They have to apply through the State Department itself. They are certainly hoping to use technology to make their community and their world a better place. They are definitely the leaders of tomorrow. It's not too fun to hear me talk all day. And so students really learn and talking with themselves, learning from each other. This is kind of helping guide the process. And so we kind of set it up that we introduced the techniques, we introduce the language and the concepts, and we let them explore it next so that they can begin to have ownership of the material so that by the end of this week they'll start working on a research project of their own and their teams to be able to start implying this and making hypotheses with their own kind of critical thinking process going on. So by letting them have the steps early now and we're walking through them. That helps give them the confidence to do it on their own. I guess.