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Meet Maria Webster, aka ubergeeke, an engineering student, geek, and chronicler of what women in tech are doing at .51. She answered some questions for me to give the BlogHer readers an opportunity to learn more about this interesting woman. Q: I noticed your blog, .51, or dotFiveOne, when you first registered at BlogHer and have been following you ever since. Your blog's tagline is "Geekspace for Women." Tell us a little about your reasons for starting the blog. A: Last spring, I was searching the web for sites about and for women in technology. As an engineer-in-training and a lifelong geek, I wanted a site that spoke to me personally about the technical interests I have. I wanted to see a site that focused on what women were doing in tech and not necessarily about the trials we face. I couldn't find such a site, and I was *very* surprised. So I built one. The whole purpose of dotFiveOne is to focus on what women are *doing*. There are many great sites for women who need support in their fields, who want to network with other women, who want to explore the challenges we experience in our endeavors. I want to celebrate our accomplishments. Q: I'm guessing from your "Geekspace for Women" blog description that you think women need more spaces on the web and in the public view. How do you think women are doing in the world of tech and engineering and science? A: We're doing wonderfully! The best part of blogging for dotFiveOne is the research I do every day. The results are fascinating - women building circuits, women diving the ocean depths, women on the space station, women exploring physics and biology, women working with robots. We are doing and accomplishing so much! Q: I get the impression from your posts about building your own PC and links to the IEEE Women in Engineering page that you're an engineer. What is your background? A: I had a typical geek start. I spent my grade-school years drawing multiplication tables for fun, my middle school years reading fantasy fiction, my high school years reading sci-fi and watching "Star Trek". The geekiness waned a bit during my first stint in college - like a lot of young, idealistic people, I was more interested in the social sciences than in the technical side of things, so I didn't get professional about technology until my late twenties. My interest in computers led to work in systems administration, and I've dabbled in that for over a decade. I decided to go back to school to finish my degree, and exposed myself to computer science and computer engineering before I settled on electrical engineering and physics. I love my coursework. My studies led to my involvement in amateur rockets, amateur radio, open source software and hardware, and basic gadgetry. I love hacking on things myself. Q: What kind of work do you do? A: My official title is "Development Engineer", but I'm essentially a renaissance woman: some web development, some systems administration, some technical writing, some quality assurance testing and regulatory exploration - whatever needs doing, I do. I often find that my personal projects run in parallel with whatever I'm working on for my job. Works out nicely. ;-) Q: You wrote Title IX In Science & Engineering: Doing The Best With What We've Got on BlogHer a while back. In it you "put your head on the chopping blog" to argue for quotas based on gender in Title IX laws. Do you still think things need to change in the Title IX laws? A: I don't think things need to change in the **laws**. I think the change needs to happen in the areas where those laws would be applied. Women are still under-represented in the STEM categories of our educational institutions, and we need a better plan for getting more women in those departments now. Q: You go by ubergeeke in most places. Seems like a great choice for you. If the engineering isn't enough to qualify you as an uber geek, you are also interested in the American Radio Relay League. What does that involve? A: Amateur Radio is a new hobby for me. I took the test for the Technician Class license last spring, and have a handheld radio, but I haven't spent a great deal of time chatting over the air with folks as I've been busy with other things. If other women
