We live in a digital dominated world, in which the ability to speak in the language of the machines will not be a guarantee of success, it will be a basic skill such as reading and writing. In MiniVinci, our aim is to create a love for science, engineering, programming among children and teenagers… How do we begin to change technology perception? Most students believe that the technology is boring, difficult, uncreative and it has little social application.

In addition, there are several problems that contribute to the lack of diversity in this field and we must look for solutions to achieve a greater presence of women in STEAM careers. The best way to love technology is practicing it and experiencing it. This talk will show how creative and challenging projects can help people without interested in technology to overcome those fears and create their own devices. The world needs more people in tech, so we need to awaken the interest in technological vocations in all children.

Patricia Heredia Gil is an engineer, teacher and director in MiniVinci, a center where she inspires girls and boys to approach technology, teaching them electronics, robotics, programming, design…

Since she was a child, she was very curious and she was very clear that she wanted to be an inventor. After graduating in Telecommunications Engineering by University of Zaragoza in Spain, she started to work for Equitel as a Firmware Engineer designing and programming electronic systems for digital audio projects in embedded networks and real-time systems for companies like Indra, Ikusi and CAF.

She was always remembering that during her childhood she did not see other girls who were passionate about something like that. So, in 2016 she created MiniVinci and now she tries to change things. She works to increase the number of the women in STEAM careers: she organizes events like Women Techmakers, she has a YouTube channel, ValPat STEAM, to inspire girls in technology, she gives talks for girls…

The mission of IEEE Women in Engineering (WIE) is to facilitate the global inspiration, engagement and advancement of women in technical disciplines, and to create a vibrant community of IEEE women and men collectively using their diverse talents to innovate for the benefit of humanity.

Coherent with framework, since 2017 the Women in IES team within the Membership Committee of the Industrial Electronics Society has been working towards promoting the participation of women in IES, so as to create a comfortable environment for women in IES to meet, network, and develop their careers. To this aim, the Women in IES team has developed a three-year roadmap that includes focused actions to encourage girls and young women to pursue careers in any engineering discipline close to Industrial Electronics and to support inclusion and diversity in the workplace in general. Lucia Lo Bello, as the Women in IES Chair, will describe the action already taken and the future ones.

Lucia Lo Bello is tenured Associate Professor at the University of Catania, Italy. She received the M.S. degree in Electronic Engineering (1994) and the Ph.D. degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Catania (1998). She was Guest Professor at the University of Malardalen, Sweden, in 2014 and Visiting Researcher at Seoul National University, Korea (2000-01). She authored or coauthored more than 150 technical papers in the area of automotive communications, industrial networks, real-time embedded systems, and wireless sensor networks. She is Senior Member of the IEEE. Prof. Lo Bello is the current Industrial Electronic Society representative within IEEE Women in Engineering. She is an IES AdCom member.

Gender gap in computer science related fields is one of the most critical among all technological areas. This paper provides some insights about this phenomenon and describes the methodology used to create gender commissions with a territorial structure. Territorial structure provides an added potential very useful for the impact of the activities of the commission. The creation of two gender structures in Catalonia around informatics engineering and artificial intelligence, two close areas where the presence of women is critical both at professional level, as well as training level, is presented. donesCOEINF is the gender commission of the Official Chamber of Informatics Engineering in Catalonia, and has a more professional profile. donesIAcat is the gender gap of the Catalan Association for Artificial Intelligence and has a more scientific profile. Both work together with other gender commissions and associations in Catalonia and abroad to better understand the phenomenon and develop actions that contribute to reduce the gender gap in these fields. The paper shows how are them organized and which kind of activities and collaborations are them developing.

Ph.D. Karina Gibert is a Full Professor at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya-BarcelonaTech (UPC). Bachelor in Informatics Engineering, 1990. Ph.D. in Computer Science, 1995. Postgraduate in University Teaching, 1996. She holds many relevant positions, including member of the governmental working team Catalonia.AI (since 2018), Founder of Commission donesCOEINF (2018), ViceDean for Big Data and Data Science of the Official Professional Chamber of Informatics Engineering of Catalonia (COEINF) (from 2017), Subdirectorf Intelligence Data Science and Artificial Intelligence Research center (IDEAI) (from 2018), Founder of donesIAcat, (2019), member of the Gender Commission of Coordinator of the Women in AI group of interest from the Spanish Association for Artificial Intelligence Association (2019). Editor of JRC journal Environmental Modelling and Software, Elsevier, (from 2018). Member of the Gender and Equality Commission of the Intercolegial of Professional Official Chambers from Catalonia (from April 2019). Board of the Int’l Environmental Modelling and Software Society (iEMSs, from 2016), Advisor of Observatori de la Sostenibilitat d’Andorra (in intensive data-driven processes, from 2018), Member of the IASC Committee on Computational Statistics and Data Mining for Knowledge Discovery (Int’l Association of Statistical Computing, from 2015), Elected Fellow (and member of the board) of the Int’l Environmental Modelling and Software Society (2007). Member of the Experts committee of hospital Guttmann (from 2005).

She leads courses related with Statistics, Multivariate Analysis, Data Science and Intelligent Decision Support in several degrees and masters, mainly at UPC. Interested in innovation for teaching, she is part of the Professional Skills commission at the Barcelona School of Informatics from 2016 and member of eHealth Eurocampus.

Pioneer member of the Knowledge Engineering and Machine Learning (KEMLg) research group from 1986 and head of the group in 2013-2016 (group with excellence research certification from Catalan government from 2003). Co-founder and secretary of the IDEAI Research Center, 2017. Her scientific production has continuously been recognized as excellent by the Spanish Government from 1990, (44 SCI-papers, more than 300 publications, 19 in QI, H-index 23). “Highly accessed paper” distinction to HARPS 8(28)1:16. She has edited 5 JCR special issues related with Data Science and AI.

She has been distinguished with the “donaTIC 2018 Award” in the academic/researcher category by the Generalitat de Catalunya, 2018 and the “First HackingBullipedia contest Award”, 2013 related with the famous chef Ferran Adrià.