Physics Wonder Girls Program on its Eleventh Year: Promoting Diversity and Equity among Middle School, High School and University Women Students

On the occasion of its 11th anniversary, the Physics Wonder Girls Program has evolved into a comprehensive program that stimulates and sustains interest in physics among female students in middle school, high school and university level. The free Physics program is based on the campus of Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This year, the program supported 28 middle school and 4 high school participants selected from a pool of high-performing students in the Philadelphia-New Jersey-Maryland region in an intensive week-long immersive program whose theme revolved around Renewable Energy. Participants came from 23 distinct schools and sixty percent were minorities. Campers engaged in hands-on physics and energy-themed projects, building energy conversion devices such as solar-powered cars, solar-powered fidget spinners, solar cookers, wind turbines, and solar trackers, and used infrared cameras to audit energy loss. Campers presented two "Equity-in-Energy"-themed Posters Sessions that featured the lives and contribution of women in physics. Campers received free kits including a digital multimeter. The middle school campers were mentored by 13 university STEM majors and 4 high school students who were camp graduates and who did advanced research experiments during the camp. Participants interacted with STEM majors who serve as crew and 4 guest women physicists and engineers. They toured R&D and manufacturing facilities of a multinational food company, and gave capstone presentations of their favorite energy projects. Past camp graduates returned to the camp as STEM professionals, this time as speakers. Campers also introduced to demonstrations of quantum effects in superconductors (Meissner effect) and quantum information. To sustain interest, camp graduates are invited to do research energy research with university faculty during the year and to physics tours and seminars. I report and reflect on the products of the camp, status of graduates, program assessments, and the future direction of the program.