Provost Promotes Diverse Inventors, Mentors and Entrepreneurs

Liesl Folks, senior vice president for academic affairs, provost and professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Arizona, attended Flourish HERE, Tech Launch Arizona's "unconference" for women in STEM, on Oct. 1.

Folks, an internationally recognized expert in magnetic materials and devices, nanoscale metrology, and spin-electronic devices, issued a call to action for women to venture into the STEM disciplines – and for everyone to encourage that engagement. The event featured breakout sessions, a panel discussion and a networking mixer featuring information tables from local groups.

“Women have as many great ideas as their male colleagues, so we’re leaving talent on the bench by not having equal representation,” Folks said. “We’re not developing the best possible technologies when we’re not including all sorts of people at the table to design those technologies.”