NASA astronaut Dr. Ellen Ochoa is the special guest at the "Expanding Your Horizons" conference on Saturday, Mar. 18 at Sonoma State University. Participants will include seventh and eighth grade students, adult educators and parents from Sonoma, Lake and Mendocino counties.
The conference fosters an awareness of career opportunities in math, engineering, science, and technology-related fields, as well as provides opportunities for young women to meet and interact with positive role models who are active in math and science-related careers.
This year's workshop topics range from constructing lemon flashlights, exploring veterinary careers to learning more about NASA's "scale universe."
"Expanding Your Horizons" is a nationwide conference reaching more than 625,000 young women around the country and is held locally to encourage young women to take an interest in math and science. In Sonoma County alone, more than 5,000 girls have attended the conference over the past fourteen years.
Ochoa will be speaking throughout the day to motivate and educate conference attendees about the importance of a good education in math and science.
"It's a unique conference," said Julie Silk, President of EYH Sonoma County, "because we believe it provides people with important services that increase the interest of young women in mathematics and science through positive, hands-on workshops."
Pre-registration is required for this event with a deadline of Mar. 10. The Expanding Your Horizons website, http://eyh-soco.org, provides details about Expanding Your Horizons Sonoma County, the upcoming 2006 conference, registration information, links to math and science resources, and Dr. Ellen Ochoa's biography.
For more information, call the Expanding Your Horizons hotline at (707) 664-2241.
