“All eyes were on us,” recalls Caitlin Shea Butler ’04, one of the first graduates of Smith’s Picker Engineering Program, which was endowed by Jean Sovatkin Picker ’42 and her husband. Since that inaugural class, the number of Smith alum engineers has grown from 19 to nearly 600. Whether in AI or aerospace, they’re transforming the field—one where women still make up less than 20% of the workforce.
Smith, in the Moment
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“I have been a very STEM focused my whole life. With courses like first-year seminars at Smith, I have gotten an opportunity to study the liberal arts from a closer distance.”
“It’s a disservice to women athletes to expect anything but the best for themselves. We talk about winning. We talk about why it’s important. We talk about why they need to own what they’re good at.”
Professor of Sociology and of Latin American & Latino/a Studies
“Because of what I learned and now teach at Smith, I am more committed than ever to Sophia Smith’s vision of ‘reforming the evils of society’ through our work ‘as teachers, as writers, as mothers, as members of society.’”
“I am so thankful that my 18-year-old self unwittingly chose an education that has lived on inside me and continues to teach me things a quarter century after the fact.”
