The rebellion of female adolescents in robotics

El Mercurio

Translated from Spanish.

Today more than ever there are adolescent women who are participating in educational robotics. They occupy a leadership position and excel in international competitions, they are mentors and they open opportunities for the generations to come. Here, four of them tell how robotics has been “their STEM school” before entering the university.

Belén Guede, 20, does not remember the exact moment when everything started. She thinks there are several factors. The formation of groups that promote the development of technologies among women, but also the positioning of several Chilean teenagers in prominent and strategic positions in global robotics competitions.

“That there are women captains is very important, because it allows girls to see that there are women in the robotics,” says the current student of Information Management and Management Control at the University of Chile.

Belén Guede has an outstanding career in technology at her young age and not yet graduated from undergraduate. Winner in 2015 of the “Challenge for Change” contest of the Microsoft YouthSpark program, among more than two thousand participants from around the world, with a project to bring robots to young people in public libraries, she is also the founder of the STEM Academy Chile, a NGO dedicated to the creation of communities and educational robotics teams in Chilean schools and lyceums.

One Monday afternoon is at FabLab UC, a digital fabrication workshop located on the San Joaquin campus of the Catholic University where physical objects are produced, through small-scale machinery, that give life to robots that she and other teenagers deploy in the competitions.

Belén Guide is a pioneer in a group of young Chileans who today stand out in educational robotics. Being all under 20 years old, they occupy leadership positions and participate in international competitions. They have opened the way to new ones, managing to take a discipline until a few years ago that is far and complex, to an increasing number of followers. They have developed their own technological projects, as self-taught, without having even graduated from university.

Next to her is Macarena Abarca, 16 years old, participant in robotics teams, Inspiratec 2017 award, Girls in Tech Chile volunteer and founder of “GIFT Robotics”, an educational initiative to take robotics to countries where it is not yet a part of education, such as Turkey and Norway. Belén and Macarena have become role models for a generation.

And then there are Valentina Flores and Francisca Montecinos, both 16, promoters of educational robotics, as well as outstanding competitors in world competitions.

For all, robotics has become a school that has brought them closer to the world of careers in science, technology, and mathematics (STEM) and has become an excuse to develop soft skills and learn from collaborative work with people from different countries.

“Robotics delivers many tools and experiences that are not found elsewhere. Reading a book you will not be left with the same memories as being with a team, debating what the robot is going to do, about the sensors that have to be used on what language to use. Robotics is a complete experience,” says Francisca Montecinos.

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