On Tuesday, SWE ECI combined two of our popular annual events: Welcome to the Corridor Trivia and Lunch Webinars to do a lunch time edition of trivia!  The trivia consisted of 4 rounds of questions titled "I'm from Cedar Rapids," "Name that Iowa City," "swe," and "Hi, I'm new here!"  Six teams competed from companies around the corridor and everyone had a lot of fun learning a bit more about Iowa and women in STEM.  In the end, our virtual team of Sarah Piburn (HR Green) and Beth Westlake (IDT) won the day!  Thanks to all who participated!

Congratulations to our newly elected FY24 SWE-ECI Core Board!  

President = Kristen Wagner
Vice President = Jill Nagle
Treasurer = Katie Allen
Secretary = Riley Cranston
Communications/Marketing Secretary = Sam Armstrong
Membership Secretary = Keerthana Reddy
College Outreach Chair = Shelby Baker
K-12 Outreach Chair = Sarah Piburn
Professional Development Chair = Henal Patel 

And a special shout out to our Core Board "first timers" - Sarah, Riley, and Henal!  We are excited to get to know all of you as we work together this FY. 

SWE-ECI had a great time celebrating the end of the FY at Lion Bridge Brewing Co on Tuesday, June 6th.  Thank you to the founder and owner of Lion Bridge, Quin McClain, for the fabulous technical tour of the Brewery!   The group had a great time enjoying some yummy craft beer, appetizers, and networking.  Lastly, we handed our Section Award for the end of the year.  Congratulation to all of the winners below!
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• Outstanding New Member =  Shelby Baker
• Section Supporter Award = Sam Armstrong
• SWEsterhood Award = Jill Nagle
• Outstanding Participation Award = Beth Blanco
• Outstanding Leadership Award = Kristen Wagner
• President's Choice: Cloak & Dagger Award = Katie Allen

On Friday, May 12th, SWE ECI gathered in 6 different conference rooms across the corridor as well as virtually to watch 2 Ted Talks about AI: where we are now and where it's going. 

The first talk was by Alona Fyshe asking "Does AI Actually Understand Us?"  She made some interesting comparisons between AI and human brains, specifically on how they process instructions.  She talked about how AI could fool people into thinking they were interacting with a human, and perhaps if we only look at the input/output of the interaction, that is possible.  However, she said "it's what's inside that counts."  Her team is working to study the actual neural networks that AI forms and determine how similar that is to a human brain.

The second talk was by Karen Lellouche Tordjman asking "Siri, Alexa, Google... what comes next?"  She talked about the current state of AI personal assistants and how they currently mostly handle only one thing: car, health, etc.  She said there are two main barriers to them becoming fully integrated across our lives: voice and breadth, but researchers are working feverishly on both.  With that in mind, she painted a very interesting picture of a future with AI we couldn't live without.

In our discussions, we touched on the amazing leaps AI has made so far just in our lifetimes, and wondered about how dependent not only current but future generations have become on it.  What has society lost in creativity, spelling ability, or otherwise by our reliance on AI so far?  But what might we have gained?  Technology always brings change and a need to adapt - is this just the next step?  How far is too far for computers to have access into our lives and privacy?  We had some very interesting conversation and we thank everyone for attending!

For this years membership appreciation event we took a class on how to build our own charcuterie boards! Allie Lanham from the HangryLady led us through how to pick cheeses, meats, veggies and fruits that compliment each other on a board. It was a great time getting to see new and familiar faces during this class as we learned how to create a rose out of salami! 
It was such a pleasure to host this class for members, and we hope those who joined it enjoyed the yummy treats they got to take home. We hope to see more next time! If you enjoyed this event and want more cooking or food style events dont hesitate to comment below what else youd like to do!

If anyone is interested in purchasing charcuterie boards or appetizers for your next event, Allie has a spot at NewBo. 

During Engineers Week, on Thursday February 23rd, SWE-ECI hosted a technical tour of the P&G Power Oral Care Site located in Iowa City.  The group learned the very technical process of making an Oral B electric toothbrush. Thank you to our P&G tour guides!  
After the event the group headed to Hudson's Southside Tap for some appetizers and networking! 
​Thank you to all that joined!