Sally Ride Archives | Gale Blog: Library & Educator News

Posted on February 17, 2016

I love learning about history, and there’s nothing like having the entire month of March devoted to the often overlooked contributions of women.I take my middle-school daughter to historic sites (sometimes with her feet dragging), and it’s great when she connects to historic figures to further understand what she reads about in books. Here are some notable women we’ve “met” in our travels:

A Deborah Sampson re-enactor was our tour guide along Boston’s Freedom Trail. She related her fascinating story – dressing as a man to fight in the Revolutionary War – as we toured some of the sites of the American Revolution. Years later, she fought for – and eventually received – a soldier’s pension.

Read moreWomen Unite!

By Jennifer Albers-Smith

I was a Computer Science major for a couple years at the University of Michigan (before declaring an English and Sociology double major) and participated in the Women in Science & Engineering (WISE) residence program. One of the events on our radar was the Sally Ride Science Festival that took place on North Campus. Each year, I was amazed as the campus was swarmed with hundreds of children. The festival, which still takes place each year at colleges across the United States, it is a fun-filled day of science projects, workshops, and experiences for middle schoolers.

This festival struck me in particular because no one had encouraged me (outside of my chemist father and pharmacist mother) to turn my interest in science into a career. There weren’t programs for young girls (or at least none in my area) trying to promote scientific careers in a fun way. And as a pioneer for STEM education and the first American woman in space, Sally Ride deserves a shout-out for this month’s focus on Women’s History Month.