Tag Archives: Middle East

69 Certified Mentors – a Different Normality

Eileen Brewer 2015 Eileen Brewer
Director, Security Appliance Team, Symantec
Mountain View, California USA

As of today, Mentoring Standard has certified 69 mentors from 16 countries in Africa, Central Asia, the Middle East, Europe and America. When I read down the Honor Roll, I am proud and honored to be working with such remarkable men and women.  I see in this developing community a shared commonality of excellence and generosity.  Since the first mentor was certified in August 2015,  69 have met the standard to be honored as Regular Mentors, and three have in addition been recognized as Advanced Mentors: Eileen Brewer (USA), Naira Ayrapetyan (Turkmenistan), and Dr. Kenza Khomsi (Morocco).   Mentoring Standard certifies mentors from around the world who can prove they hold within themselves the following 3 qualities:

  • Significant Mentoring History.
  • Good Reputation.
  • Respectable Professional Experience.
Naira Ayrapetyan 2015 Naira Ayrapetyan
Senior Maintenance Engineer, Petronas Carigali Turkmenistan, TechWomen 2015 Fellow
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan

Every day’s news is full of a fractured, fighting, frightening world.  Yet, in the Honor Roll is a different normality: successful professionals from a vast diversity of demographics, profession, and geography who are not only learning and growing themselves but have spent years helping other people to achieve their goals and grow their careers.  Many of the Certified Mentors have been participants in the US State Department’s TechWomen program, or in the Sun Microsystems Engineering mentoring program called SEED, or they are friends or relations of mentors who were.  Half of the Certified Mentors are also TechWomen Fellows: 2011-2015 mentees of STEM leaders in the San Francisco Bay Area.  That is, these are women who came to the USA to be mentees but had already been mentors themselves for many years.

This is validation of the research presented in the Lifetime Value of Mentoring 2013 project: “…patterns from key [mentoring] programs show that successful mentees will go on to become mentors and many mentors serve over and over – in a variety of programs. Mentors also become Mentees as needed. Thus, disconnected programs may be informally in the same network because of having participants in common.”  I am still working on the first Mentoring Standard data report on the 2015 cohort of Certified Mentors.

Mentor Certification documents and celebrates your past and ongoing mentoring accomplishments – it does not require you to join a new mentoring program or take additional training. Ever consider becoming a Certified Mentor yourself?

Kenza Khomsi 2015 Dr. Kenza Khomsi
Meteorologist Engineer, Direction de la Météorologie Nationale, TechWomen 2015 Fellow
Casablanca, Morocco

A page from the Honor Roll

Mentoring Standard Honor Roll 2015

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Mentor Certification – First Cohort

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The interest in Mentor Certification by Mentoring Standard continues strong. We have already certified eight Regular-level mentors this month.  There are twenty-eight on the Honor Roll (and more in the queue).  I am working with the first applicant for Advanced-level Certified Mentor now.  Doing well for just four months into this program!

Many of Certified Mentors have been participants in the TechWomen initiative of the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, or were in SEED (Sun Microsystems’ Engineering Enrichment and Development), two of the mentoring programs I have helped to design and create since 2001.  Countries where Certified Mentors live include: Cameroon, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, Nigeria, Palestine, South Africa, Turkmenistan, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and of course the USA.

I am putting together the first Mentoring Standard data report on the initial cohort of Certified Mentors now. One of the patterns I am tracking is in what formal mentoring programs they have participated. In addition to TechWomen and SEED, I have seen several each in Technovation, and Cherie Blair Foundation for Women. As we get beyond the initial group, additional programs will be referenced – not all focused on women or STEM.

Mentor Certification documents and celebrates your past and ongoing mentoring accomplishments – it does not require you to join a new mentoring program or take additional training. If you are interested in following up for yourself, read: Get Certified.

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Images Copyright 2015 by Katy Dickinson – with thanks to Kathy Jenks!

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TechWomen 2015 Winding Down

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We are enjoying the last bittersweet days with our dear 98 TechWomen mentors from 19 countries in Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia. TechWomen participants enjoyed the Volunteer Day (tilling the soil at Veggielution in San Jose), and Community Celebration in San Francisco (hosted by Automattic), including seed grant awards presented to the six winners of the 22 October TechWomen Pitch Night presentations (hosted by Google):

  1. Team Nigeria’s “STEM in a Box” – this education project was also voted “Audience Favorite”
  2. Palestine’s “STEM Fem” – project to connect technical women to jobs
  3. Jordan’s “She Can Do It!” – focus on workforce training
  4. Egypt’s “She is Back” – project to re-employ women returning to workplace
  5. Kyrgyzstan’s “We Care” – project to improve healthcare
  6. Sierra Leone’s “Big Sisters” – to help orphans left by Ebola epidemic (collaborating with Families Without Borders

Today was the first of our visits to the US State Department – Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in Washington DC. Tomorrow is our most formal dress day, featuring lunch in the Benjamin Franklin State Dining Room.

During this term, Mentoring Standard has not only provided training for both TechWomen mentors and mentees but we have also been helping program participants to become Certified Mentors. My company’s Honor Roll of Certified Mentors is growing quickly! Several of the TechWomen Emerging Leaders are now working hard to finish their submissions before they return to their home countries. Busy days!

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Images Copyright 2015 by Katy Dickinson

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Disappointing “Revolution” at Computer History Museum

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The Computer History Museum exhibit “Revolution: The First 2000 Years of Computing” was a big disappointment.  Our TechWomen Cultural Mentor team brought 19 STEM experts from the Middle East, Africa, and Central Asia to tour the Computer History museum yesterday.  TechWomen is a prestigious initiative of the US Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.  Our group was very disappointed to see almost no historical role models for technical women or people of color in this show, not even Admiral Grace Hopper (inventor of the compiler, Computer History Museum Fellow), Katherine Johnson (early NASA mathematician and “Computer”), or Jean Sammet (early computer language developer, Computer History Museum Fellow).

Despite the exhibit title, by the time our helpful docent had brought our tour group up to the 1970s, it was clear that we were seeing a celebration of the March of White American Men’s Technical Progress.  Ada Lovelace tshirts are for sale in the museum’s bookstore, and the museum has 7 women among its 70 prestigious Fellows; however among those Fellows only Jean Bartik was included in this sad exhibit that has been up since 2011.  There were, however, very large images trivializing women: showing her legs while sitting on a computer, holding a food bowl looking adoringly at her man who is using a computer, and using a headset because “She Makes Friends as Well as Reservations”.  Almost no photos that did show women included their names (this is called “erasure”).

Kate McGregor (Education Programs Consultant, Community Programs, Computer History Museum) was kind enough to discuss this exhibit with me.  She told me that there is special tour once a month that focuses on women in technology (Separate but Equal?).   She also said I missed seeing the photo of Adele Goldberg with the Alto computer. So it seems that the exhibit of “2000 Years of Computing” names just two women: Jean Bartik, and Adele Goldberg.

Having spent many years developing the Notable Technical Women project and predecessor projects to celebrate and document the impressive history of women in computer science, I was sorry we went to this museum exhibit and wish we had taken the our remarkable TechWomen leaders someplace else.

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Images Copyright 2015 by Katy Dickinson

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New Front Yard

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During the last week or so, we have been following up on the water conserving landscape plans I wrote about in August. So far, we have removed the old lawn, brought in new topsoil and decorative boulders, created Paul’s seating area, and placed hundreds of new plants. While I am in Monterey tomorrow with the TechWomen mentors and Emerging Leaders from Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia, John is going to finish installing the new watering system. The last step is to put mulch (bark chips) around the plants to conserve water and protect them. So far, I am happy with the results!  Once everything is complete, I can submit receipts to the Santa Clara Valley Water District (SCVWD) for a refund of part of the cost of this big project.

August 2015:
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October 2015:
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Images Copyright 2015 by Katy Dickinson

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Mentor, Mentee Development by Mentoring Standard

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Mentoring Standard has been honored to provide three training events for the 2015 TechWomen mentors and mentees from 19 countries in Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, on 22 September (hosted by Juniper Networks in Sunnyvale), 24 September (hosted by the Institute of International Education in San Francisco), and today (hosted by Symantec in Mountain View):

It has been a pleasure to work with such an accomplished, talented, motivated, and inspiring group of technical leaders.  We look forward to the next step – working with this community on mentor certification!

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Images Copyright 2015 Katy Dickinson – with thanks to Kathy Jenks and Eileen Brewer!

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TechWomen Country Introductions

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The 98 TechWomen Emerging Leaders introduced themselves to us today at the Juniper Networks Aspiration Dome in Sunnyvale, California. Each of the 19 country groups had about five minutes to show a video, dance, sing their national anthem or perform a skit to tell us about their traditions and life. Most wore their national dress. They are all so beautiful and talented! We were welcomed by our staunch champion at the US State Department – Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, Sheila Casey, were moved by a talk by Mitchell Baker (Executive Chairwoman, Mozilla), and even heard a video poem about women by Bulelwa Basse, the South African poet whom we met earlier this year. The day ended with our beloved IIE staff performing a medley of American dances as a gift in return.

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Images Copyright 2015 by Katy Dickinson

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