Girls Get Tips on Meeting Career Goals

Rosy Carlos wants to be a family doctor. Kashia Slade wants to be an architectural engineer. Ashley Simms wants to work for NASA.

All attended the sixth annual “Brighter Horizons: Careers in Math and Science,” a conference for girls in grades six through 12, at Rio Mesa High School in Oxnard on Saturday. Participants received practical information and encouragement on meeting career goals.

“Coming to this event showed me it takes 11 years of school to become a doctor, 14 years to be a surgeon,” said Rosy, a 10th-grader at Ventura High School. The 15-year-old had just completed a workshop titled “How to Get Into Medical School and What Do I Do Now?”

“It’ll take a lot of work, but it’s worth it,” she said.

Sponsored by the American Assn. of University Women, the conference brought together girls and women working in professions based in mathematics, science and technology. It is one of the association’s many programs aimed at promoting equality for women.

For a $6 registration fee, 1,025 girls (and a sprinkling of boys) participated in four workshops and received course materials, breakfast and lunch.

Workshop topics included engineering, cartography, crime analysis, computer technology, architecture and the aerospace industry. Other sessions taught girls how to pursue careers as coroners, math teachers, pharmacists, nurses and dental hygienists.

The most popular workshops--some of which are offered in Spanish--are those that involve animals, according to volunteer Linda Stinebaugh. The marine biology and veterinary medicine sessions filled fast, she said, adding that the workshop about getting into college was also in high demand.

It’s important to guide girls into technology careers because they pay the best, said Stinebaugh, a computer systems manager for a title insurance company.

First-time workshop leader Maria Mamhoodi, a flight surgeon at the Point Mugu Navy base, said she intends to come back next year.

“This is a wonderful service for these students,” said Mamhoodi, who escaped from Iran at age 17 and became a doctor. Students, she said, were fascinated with her story. She encouraged them to join the military, as she did, as a way to finance an expensive medical education.