Until today, I considered myself an incredible designer, implementer, and problem solver. I am a female, in a male dominated computer software engineer world. I can declare variables, parse difficult data into the latest and greatest format, and even use Photoshop to finish up my GUI's plain gray form face. That was all until today. Today, I went to a children's science museum with my three and five year old boys. It left me perplexed about my inabilities and shortcomings in a world I have not yet tapped. I have never built a "LEGO" car, "LEGO" space ship, or even a "LEGO" monster.
My little boys ran up to the massive heap of plastic brick blocks with shrills and delight, knowing the name brand without knowing how to read. My three year old, stacked similar colored blocks in a perfect block shape and then grew it larger and larger. My five year old was fortunate enough to find the remnants of an automobile with wheels intact to begin his creative adventure. I sat, and within a single blink of an eye realized I was outside my center of comfort. I was supposed to know this stuff! I own a toy store; I am a computer geek, why have I not been exposed to Lego's? I am almost 35 years old and have no idea how to form a rubber ring to a flat plate and make it work.
I looked around. There were 100% boys that surrounded the table. There were many girls at the museum, but they were working with art, motion, and much to my surprise, sitting in smaller groups talking. There were very few girls actually ENGAGED in science.
Lego had an idea a few years back to create a "girl" series of Lego's. The futuristic sticks, and people that were predominately pink and purple left little to the imagination and added no base building skill and logic components that the core Lego brand teaches with primary colors, dinosaur, car, and male-focused building sets.
I am truly disappointed that this toy has missed a complete gender. The LEGO is ingenious. Every skill from simple colors and counting all through complex robotics are found with this plastic snap toy.
Science and Technology surround us wherever we go and whatever we do. From the way we communicate to the way we entertain ourselves, we all interact with it on a daily if not hourly basis. But, if you're not already in the industry and didn't grow up with an iPod or get an HTC for your 10th birthday, is it still possible to take a course in science or technology? Or have you simply missed the hi-tech boat?
Many people start studying at University directly after high school without a real idea of what they want to do with the rest of their lives, alternatively they start working immediately and get caught in the cycle of earning an income to meet expenses very early on in life. Either way, many people reach a point in their late twenties or early thirties, where after ten years of hard work they feel they have achieved what they wanted in their selected field of study or work and start craving a new challenge. And it doesn't get much newer of much more challenging than the ever evolving field of science and technology courses.
To clarify, the field of science and technology is as broad and as all encompassing as the field of 'art'. Except, instead of paintbrushes dueling it out with HDTV, science and technology courses more often go hand in hand. From scripting mobile phone applications to mapping the genome of the common housecat, revolutionary progress in one field inevitably has an indirect field on another and ultimately on the way we live our lives. Taking a course in science and technology therefore spans all aspects of modern living.
If you want to get involved with this constantly developing field, there are some questions you are going to have to ask yourself before setting out. It's no coincidence that you can't step into cyberspace without coming face to face with the work of a hundred good to great web designers, while the work of good to great bio-engineers is a little harder to come by. Before typing out your resignation letter and stapling it to your boss's desk, ask yourself the following:
Doing a quick budget or a 'life audit', where you break down how you spend your week on average hour by hour, will help you to decide whether you have the monetary or timing capacity to invest in a career change. But investing in a course in science and technology requires serious commitment and capacity and motivation are not one in the same.
Do as much research as you can into the science or technology course that you want to pursue and see if you can find someone in that field who can answer some of your questions. Better yet, ask them to allow you to shadow them for a day. Studies show that it takes at least 10 000 hours to become an expert at anything, so realise that you will need time to become proficient in your new career and above all, remember that it's never too late to learn anything.
Guillermo Haro was a very notable Mexican thinker and is very famous because of his significant contributions in Astronomical studies. He is one of the discoverers of the Herbig-Haro objects, as well as the man behind several studies in stars, non-stellar objects, blue galaxies and many others. Also, he was lauded because of his influence in the development and growth of other areas of science and technology in his country. Despite being well known in the field of Astronomy, Haro's first professional study is that of Philosophy at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
His passion for Astronomy has contributed greatly to the development and establishment of most significant research institutes in Mexico today. His service to the improvisation of Astronomy in Mexico started during his post as Director of the Astronomical Institute of UNAM and of the Observatorio Astrofisico de Tonantzintla in the fifties and the sixties. In the year 1972, he established the INAOE, which was located next to the Tonantzintla Observatory and became its first director. During that time, he made a strong promotion to Optics and Electronics fields which paved the way to the creation of a recent and graduate studies institution outside of the country's capital- the first time that happened in the history of Mexico's science and technology research. In his term as director, INAOE has considerably grown both in the field of Optics, Electronics and Astrophysics; which continued on to these past 3 decades. Today, the center is very famous and recognized in the entire world.
Guillermo Haro was a member of the illustrious Colegio National beginning 1953. He also co-founded the La Academia de la Investigacion Cientifica. These two centers are the most significant academic institutions and gathered the most well-known intellectuals of Mexico in the fields of Science, Technology, Humanities and Arts. He was the chief promoter of the development of the Instituto Nacional de la Investigacion Cientifica which was later transformed into the Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnologia-the Mexican government's arm to develop science and technology in the country.
