 I've had really an interest in ships my whole life and when I was 14 I saw a tug-book dock at Fel's Point and I was just really struck by the size and power of the vessel and you know that really really intrigued me caught my interest on just you know working on something that was just that big and powerful as I was drawing the ships I had put together a portfolio and so I looked in the magazines and got the addresses of some of the naval architecture firms and shipyards and I was like maybe 18, 19 at the time and one called me in for an interview and it was M. Rosenblatt and son who at that time were the lead naval architects for the DD-963 Spruins class destroyers so they hired me and I was working on the CVV which is a conventional powered aircraft carrier So the challenge for me to encourage minorities and females to have an interest in STEM and also the positive role models of females and minorities that have made contributions to STEM That's really how it started. What I've learned is number one building a ship out of Legos is exactly how modern warships are designed and built today When I was one of the lead designers on the Arleigh Burke class the units went together into modules and when they were all finished they would literally join together so that's a lot like working with Legos So it's not just STEM but it's taking STEM a step further to relate it to the individual For little girls and little boys to say I can be an ammo when I grow up I can be a general, I can be a pilot so it's not just about the formulas and it's not just about experiments in the lab but it's really getting kids to believe in themselves, they themselves, right where they are that they can do it and seeing the biographies of other people who started where they are is an incredible thing