North Carolina Kick-Off Event
Over 60 people from education, business and girl- serving programs attended the North Carolina Girls Collaborative Kick-Off at three locations on Tuesday, September 18. The primary conference location, the Science House, at NC State University, used video conferencing to connect with two other locations in North Carolina. The agenda included opportunities for participants to network, presentations from AAUW and local girl-serving STEM programs, a fabulous keynote address from NC State's first African American female graduate of the meteorology program and demonstrations of some of the online NGCP tools for networking and mini-grant applications. One participant's comment at the end of the day was, "I absolutely loved spending the day with other like- minded people who care about supporting girls in STEM pursuits. I can't wait to get more involved in this effort." Congratulations to the NC leadership team!
http://www.science- house.org/ngcp/kickoff.html

New Versions of Two AWE Retention Tracking Instruments
Retention of students in engineering continues to be of concern. To best address this area, we need to know what contributes to both students persisting in engineering and what contributes to their leaving. The AWE Students Leaving Engineering and the Student Persisting in Engineering Instruments are revised and help answer these questions by identifying areas where support activities or other changes may be warranted that could impact retention. The new versions are streamlined for easier data collection and, when both are implemented, will provide comparative results for "leavers" versus "stayers".
http://www.AWEonline.org

American Association of University Women State branches get the word out about NGCP
Several AAUW state branches are publicizing NGCP on their Web sites. Check out the following for more information and contact your state or local AAUW branch to get involved.
Massachusetts:
http://www.aauw- ma.org (select 'collaborative partnerships')
North Carolina:
http://www.aauw-nc.org/wp/category/stem
Pennsylvania:
http://www.aauwpa.org/EF_science_technology. htm

California Girls Collaborative
CAL Girls Conference
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
9:30 AM-3:00 PM
UC Berkeley, Clark Kerr Campus
This event is targeted for organizations with programs that support girls in science, math, engineering and technology (STEM). Representatives from K-12 schools, higher education, professional organizations, business, government and community-based organizations are encouraged to attend. Registration fee is $25, which includes morning coffee, lunch and parking.
To register:
http://calgirls.llnl.gov/reg
More about CAL Girls and upcoming events:
http://www.ngcproject.org/california

NGCP OCTOBER WEBCAST
Tools for Collaboration Success: NGCP Mini- Grants
October 10, 2007, 11:00-12:00 PDT
Sometimes great ideas and new collaborative projects need a little help getting started. In this interactive webcast you'll learn how to create collaborations using NGCP mini-grant funding. Mini- grants are designed to support collaboration, assessment activities, projects related to addressing gaps and overlaps in service, and sharing promising practices. Past mini-grant recipients will share inspiring stories and outline strategies for successful partnership and program development. Mini-grant application basics and requirements will be presented. Since 2002, the NGCP has awarded over 100 mini-grants to organizations in California, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, Oregon, Texas, Washington, and Wisconsin that support girl- serving science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) focused programs.
To register:
http://www.ngcproject.org/events/webcast.cfm

Assessing Women and Men in Engineering Project (AWE) Offers Workshop at SWE National Convention
October 26, 2007
Make Assessment Work for YOU. Take your outreach activity to the next level. Go beyond finding out whether participants had fun. Find out if they learned what you intended. This interactive workshop will cover how to integrate good assessment into planning and follow up in even the leanest of teams, and how to turn assessment data into effective tools for continuous development, fundraising and reports. Participants will develop assessment-based implementation plans as they learn to use the new SWE-AWE ADAPT online database for tracking activities and participants (bring your laptop).
http://www.swe07.org/index.php? option=com_content&task=view&id=20&Itemid= 16

NGCP NOVEMBER WEBCAST
Effective strategies for working with girls in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)
November 14, 2007, 11:00-12:00 PST
Whether your program connects girls to professional female mentors, exposes girls to science at a local museum, or teaches girls robotics after school, there are key strategies that are effective when working with girls in STEM. Learn from experts in the field what research and practice tell us about high-quality informal learning programs for girls in STEM.
To register:
http://www.ngcproject.org/events/webcast.cfm

AWM Essay Contest: Biographies of Contemporary Women in Mathematics
To increase awareness of women's ongoing contributions to the mathematical sciences, the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) is sponsoring an essay contest for biographies of contemporary women mathematicians and statisticians in academic, industrial, and government careers.
http://www.awm- math.org/biographies/contest.html

Global Challenge Award
Want to save the planet? Win money for college? Meet people from around the world? Work on a cool project? The Global Challenge is looking for a high school student who is interested in helping save the planet from global warming and learning more about science, technology, engineering and mathematics while working with an international team using advanced technologies. This is a great after-school, independent study or curriculum enhancement project.
http://www.globalchallengeaward.org/

NPR Science Friday Podcast Archive
Harvey Mudd College President, Maria Klawe was a guest on National Public Radio's (NPR) Talk of the Nation: Science Friday program, where she discussed women and mathematics with host Ira Flatow. They were joined by actress and mathematician Danica McKellar, who authored the book "Math Doesn't Suck: How to Survive Middle-School Math Without Losing Your Mind or Breaking a Nail."
Access the podcast archive:
http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2007/Sep/

NGCP Program Directory- Register your Program Today!
The online Program Directory lists organizations and programs that focus on motivating girls to pursue STEM careers. The purpose of the directory is to help organizations and individuals network, share resources and collaborate on STEM-related projects for girls. When you sign up for the Program Directory you will enter your program description, resources available within your organization, program and/or organizational needs and contact information.
http://www.ngcproject.org/directory/index.cfm

American Association of University Women (AAUW) members across the country are serving as Regional Liaisons for the National Girls Collaborative Project. These Regional Liaisons help the people involved in the NGCP to make connections - to one another, to resources on gender equity, and to AAUW.

AWE is the Assessing Women and Men in Engineering Project, which provides exportable assessment instruments, literature resources, and methodologies for Women in Engineering and similar programs. AWE is developing resources for use by K-12 STEM programs as part of NGCP services.