Out in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (oSTEM)
oSTEM is a nonprofit professional association for LGBTQ+ people in the STEM community. OSTEM is the largest chapter-based organization focused on LGBTQ+ people in STEM.
oSTEM envisions a world where LGBTQ+ people in the STEM community are empowered to achieve success in a safe and supportive environment that celebrates their diversity and unique contributions. To join oSTEM, click here. 

Global STEM Service Award
Chapter Awards
Chapter of the Year - Group
Rookie Chapter of the Year - Group
Chapter Leader of the Year - Individual

Sponsor Awards
Strategic Alliance Award - Organization
Partner Excellence Award - Individual
LGBTQ+ Employee Network of the Year - Group
 
Volunteer Awards
Volunteer of the Year - Individual
Volunteer Spotlights - Individual, Multiple

For more information on awards applications visit: 
https://ostem.org/page/conference-awards

Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (SHPE)
SHPE's mission is to empower the Hispanic community to realize its fullest potential and impact the world through STEM awareness, access, support, and development.


SHPE awards:
Application Deadline: July 15

SHPE Technical Achievement and Recognition (STAR): 
These awards honor outstanding professionals for their dedication, commitment, and selfless efforts to advance Hispanics in STEM careers. STAR Awards also recognize a company and government agency for demonstrating significant, measurable, and visible assistance to further SHPE’s programs.

For more information visit:
https://www.shpe.org/events/shpe2022/star-awards-2022

American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES)
AISES is a national nonprofit organization focused on substantially increasing the representation of Indigenous peoples of North America and the Pacific Islands in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) studies and careers. To join AISES, click here

AISES Awards:
Application deadline: May 21

Indigenous Excellence 
The Indigenous Excellence award is to acknowledge individuals who have done substantial work to advance programs and opportunities for indigenous students and professionals in STEM education and careers. Professionals with 10 or more years of experience working within their tribal/Indigenous community will be considered. The nominee may or may not have a technical background. The nominee will be evaluated on the following criteria (100 points total):

Technical Excellence
The Technical Excellence award is designated for an individual who has made a significant contribution to science, engineering, or technology by having designed, developed, managed or assisted in developing a product, service, system, or intellectual property. The Technical Excellence nominee will be evaluated on the following criteria

For any questions, please contact kjfernandez@aises.org 
For more information Visit:
https://forms.aises.org/2021-poy


Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers (SASE)
SASE is dedicated to the advancement of Asian heritage scientists and engineers in education and employment to achieve their full career potential. In addition to professional development, SASE also encourages members to contribute to enhancing the communities in which they live. To join SASE, click here.

SASE Awards: 
Nominations Open on January 3, 
Nominations close on April 16, 1:59 PM ET

SASE’s Leadership Awards program is open to individuals and organizations who exemplify its mission.
The purpose of the awards is to celebrate technical accomplishments and advancements in the fields of science, engineering, and technology and to recognize exemplary leadership in the community including volunteerism.
Each recipient will be recognized at the SASE National Conference and STEM Career Fair Gala Dinner

Nominees may be eligible for recognition in only one of the categories below.  
SASE Organization of the Year (Company)
SASE Organization of the Year (Government) 
SASE Engineer/ Scientist of the Year (Company) 
SASE Engineer/ Scientist of the Year (Government) 
SASE Information Technologist of the Year 
SASE Executive of the Year
SASE Emerging Leader of the Year
SASE Service Impact Award 
SASE Advocate Award
SASE Distinguished Career Award

For more information visit: 
https://www.saseconnect.org/get-involved/awards/leadership

​

​Dear SWE Graduate Community,
As part of the GradSWE Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) blog series, the D&I team has interviewed Mikayla Moody, a Biomedical Engineering Ph.D. candidate at the University of Connecticut Health Center. Mikayla share with us how graduate student organizations can help to develop a feeling of belonged in a Ph.D. program.

Interview: 

Can you please tell us more about your experience on participating in student organizations, how it started? Were you invited directly from other students? Did your campus or department encourage you to join student organizations? 

Before entering graduate school, I knew that getting a graduate degree could be a very isolating process. While searching for graduate schools to apply to, one of my requirements was that there were organizations for graduate students. The University of Connecticut met that requirement. One of the organizations there is the Student Association of Graduate Engineers (SAGE), where graduate students from all the School of Engineering departments could come together as a community to learn and socialize. Another organization unique to UConn is the John Lof Leadership Academy (JLLA), which is a two-year program where engineering graduate students can learn leadership skills. However, with this program, I had to apply to get in, so I made sure to be involved with SAGE when I started my PhD before any decision was made about my application to join JLLA. 

A few months after starting my PhD, I was accepted into JLLA, which was very exciting because I knew this experience would not only help me grow as a person and a leader, but also, I could connect with other engineering graduate students. However, I decided to stay in SAGE as well since I had friends that weren’t in JLLA that would attend SAGE events with me. 

I remember one SAGE event that was a highlight of my first semester at UConn—the Halloween Social! I dressed as a Private Investigator, but also acted like Principal Investigator (PI). It was fun to hang out with new friends I had just met and to not think about lab work and classwork for a few hours.  

The beginning with SAGE and JLLA created a cascade to join other organizations and to even take on leadership roles. At UConn, I am now involved in the Graduate Chapter for Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (Grad SHPE), Graduate Chapter for Society of Women Engineers (Grad SWE), Graduate Students of Color Association (GSCA), and Graduate Organization of Latinx Students (GOLS). I got involved in these organizations due to graduate students creating advertisements via email or in person. Instagram was also a great resource for finding organizations. 

Can you please describe some of the activities you did in the organizations?  What roles were assigned to you? 

For my third year of my PhD, I actually became president of SAGE, which is honestly still a shock to me, even though I was in this position for the past year. The responsibilities of this role were to make sure the other executive board members were doing their tasks, helping think of events to do, and helping run events. It was a lot of responsibility to make sure that everything was going smoothly, but I had a great team and it was fun to meet new people within and outside of the organization. Also, this past year, I was the secretary for the Grad SHPE. I had to take notes at meetings, help plan events, and run events. I had a little bit less responsibility compared to my position in SAGE, but it was nice to interact with people who understood me because we shared similar cultures. 

For these organizations, we both had social and professional development events. For example, Grad SHPE recently had a carne asada, which is a Latin/Hispanic BBQ, that was very fun. People outside of SHPE were there as well, so it was nice to interact with familiar and new people. Moreover, SAGE had their annual poster competition with UConn’s School of Engineering where almost 50 engineering graduate students presented their work to faculty as well as people in industry and entrepreneurship.  I had to recruit volunteers for the event as well as create advertisements to encourage students to present. 

From your perspective, how are these student organizations implementing diversity and inclusion initiatives to achieve student engagement? 

Most of the organizations I am a part of, such as Grad SHPE, Grad SWE, GOLS, and GSCA, embrace diversity because they are organizations that are geared towards welcoming marginalized folks. SAGE is fairly inclusive in terms of allowing anyone and everyone that are graduate engineering students to join the meetings. Grad SHPE tries to be inclusive by allowing those within STEM, and not just engineering, to join. 


However, I think the organizations I am a part of can have more conversations around DEI work at the university and beyond. By existing, we do a lot in providing welcoming and inclusive spaces. However, I definitely think more work can and should be done. The only problem is that graduate students already do so much, so that would be adding extra work on our shoulders that we might not have the energy or time to do, unfortunately. 

Can you share some activities or circumstances that you experienced in these organizations that made you feel that you belonged in your Ph.D. program? 

I would say that Grad SHPE had made me feel like I belonged in my PhD program. SAGE was very eye-opening because I got to meet other engineering graduate students, but most of them didn’t look like me or understood me in terms of my heritage. When I got to help establish Grad SHPE and help plan events with the executive board, I then started to realize that I do belong in my PhD program and that I am not the only Latinx student doing it. This was especially solidified when the UConn Grad SHPE e-board went to the SHPE National Convention last year. We got to meet with other wonderful Hispanic/Latinx graduate students in engineering from around the world who are studying in the United States. At that moment, I knew I wasn’t alone and that if they could do it, so could I. 


What piece of advice would you like to give to another grad student looking for a student organization involvement, and why?

I would suggest first looking on social media, especially Instagram, to see what organizations are out there. Many organizations have an Instagram page and post about events that they are holding. Additionally, don’t delete those emails you get from your university detailing events happening this week/month. A lot of organizations tend to use these various advertising avenues, and this could be one of them. You could also ask/email a more senior graduate student or your department head to see if your department has a graduate student association (GSA). Lastly, most universities have a central location where all of the organizations are listed on a website. Take a look at that website to see if any organizations spark your interest.

Is there any additional comment you would like to add?

I would like to add that having a support group can be a game changer during graduate school. You don’t have to find it in an organization, your department, or even your lab, but it is nice to have people you can talk to about your experiment failing, how tough it is to write a manuscript, etc. It is easy to isolate yourself during a graduate program, so sometimes you just have to put yourself out there in order to find your group of people. 

Bio:

Mikayla Moody (they/she) is a Biomedical Engineering Ph.D. candidate at the University of Connecticut Health Center. They obtained their B.S. in Materials Science and Engineering at North Carolina State University in 2018. Their current research/career interests are in biomaterials, science policy, and science communication. Mikayla is currently researching the effects of acidosis on the skeletal system. Their current project is developing an explant model using mice femurs in order to determine how acidic media affects cellular and physiochemical bone dissolution. Outside of the lab, Mikayla likes to watch TV, travel, hike, and cuddle with their cat. They have been fortunate to be able to travel around the United States as well as to Australia, Portugal, and Venezuela.


Contact information:
Email: mikayla.moody@uconn.edu
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikayla-moody-53700a134/
Twitter: @matsci_mikayla


Yareni Lara-Rodriguez (she/her/hers)
Content Creator- @YareniLara 
Diversity & Inclusion Team -SWE Graduate Community