Kylie C.

Kylie Cameron is a current high school senior at Columbiana High School in rural northeast Ohio interested in STEAM education equality, computer science for social good and environmental activism. After having an interest in learning to code since she was in middle school, Kylie began to teach herself to code using YouTube tutorials to learn HTML, CSS, and basic JavaScript because her rural school and community offered no such programs or opportunities. She then founded We Can STEAM, a student-led and run STEAM media production organization that produces written articles, infographics, and magazines to educate underserved communities about opportunities, scholarships, communities, and the STEAM jobs that are available to them. Kylie saw the need for this organization after participating in the Built By Girls WAVE mentorship program where her knowledgeable Industrial Engineering mentor from Verizon taught her about the many STEAM jobs that she could have, and that there is more than STEAM to just engineering. Over her time at We Can, she has led 15+ students globally to help her write articles, create graphics, and make online magazines, where they have created 50+ articles and 2 magazines. She also single-handedly created the We Can Community Club and the Homework Help Club which combined have amounted to 430+ club members globally where they can find mentors, other teens interested in STEAM to work on projects with, hackathons, opportunities, internships, apprenticeships, jobs, volunteering opportunities, and more! Kylie is also currently working on publishing their second magazine. Along with serving as the Founder and Project Lead, Kylie is also the Director of UI/UX Web Development, a writer, graphic designer, and interviewer of women currently working in STEAM careers. After learning all she could about programming on YouTube, she found the Girls Who Code Summer Immersion Program and applied. After being accepted to participate with Synchrony Financial, she furthered her knowledge on HTML, CSS, and JavaScript by creating a portfolio project and a BuzzFeed-like quiz on house plants. For her final project she was tasked with the Activist ToolKit Project where she created Sustain.Able, a website that simplifies everyday sustainability to encourage more people to live sustainably. The site features and education page filled with research, videos, and podcasts on climate change, a donate tab where users can take an interactive quiz to figure out which sustainable nonprofit best matches to their interests to donate to, and the search feature which allows users to search for items on their grocery lists, and then find sustainable alternatives to those projects to purchase. This project was presented to peers, Girls Who Code educators, and Synchrony Financial management and received rave reviews for its code, unique mission and features, and professional UI/UX design. Sustain.Able was then entered into the 2021 Congressional App Challenge where it won for Ohio’s sixth congressional district. Kylie was then given the opportunity to virtually present her project to members of the House of Representatives, and Congressional App Challenge sponsors including Apple, Amazon, and FaceBook. She also was accepted onto the Congressional App Challenge Advisory Board where she works on program outreach sharing information with students, parents, and educators, create social media posts and graphics, help students register, share information on the challenge and talk to students about her experience, and work on other various marketing operations. Kylie completed the United Nations Girl Up Leadership course where she learned about leadership of self and peers, where for her final project she created Rural Women in STEAM, an organization she leads by herself attempting to bridge the gap between STEAM education and girls in rural areas like herself. To do this, she is working on creating a community of mentors ready to help answer questions, create projects with, and virtually mentor girls in rural communities. She also has a community driven list of scholarships that anyone can contribute to to help rural girls fund their continuing education. Kylie is also working on creating free online courses in HTML, CSS, JavaScript, Python, C, Cybersecurity, and Cryptography so girls in rural areas can learn these languages and concepts from someone like them. Kylie then went back to Girls Who Code for their Self Paced Program where she completed all 5 courses learning HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and Python and about Cryptography and Cybersecurity through the completion of 10 projects including another portfolio, Buzzfeed-like quiz, and activism project and 2 chatbots educating people about the CIA triad, and 2 cyphers that can encrypt and decrypt messages. For her activism project she made the Rural Women in STEAM website so her organization could be more accessible to more people For her senior year, Kylie was also accepted onto TechGirlz Teen Advisory Board, where she gets the opportunity to teach middle school girls from around the world about engineering, coding, and all things STEM through workshops that she get to host through TechGirlz. She also get to update the TechGirlz curriculum for others to use and teach and will even get the opportunity to make her own curriculum. She attends monthly meetings with other TAB members, and has gotten to meet and work with so many other inspiring girls in STEAM! She will also get the opportunities to attend engineering events paid by TG, hold internships, work on a podcast, work in marketing, work in outreach, listen to speakers, and create a panel of engineers to host a Q&A panel for middle schoolers! Kylie is also currently working on completing Harvard University's introduction to Computer Science Course CS50 through the completion of lectures, projects, and labs. Along with still working on all of these projects, Kylie has worked as a volunteer UI/UX Web Developer for all of her high school career to help teens with ideas for organizations like hers bring their ideas to life. Kylie also volunteers as a public speaker for STEAM organizations, where she shares her STEAM story, shares STEAM opportunities, and answers questions from young girls interested in getting into technology. She also volunteers for her local community's Girl Scout STEM Camp where she helps Girl Scouts with special needs learn about circuits, chemistry, physics, 3D Printing, Engineering Design, HAM Radio, and other technologies. In school, Kylie participates in VEX robotics where she helps program, build, manage the engineering notebook, and compete with her team's robot. In the 2021-2022 year her team was second in the Skills Challenge. In the 2022-2023 school year her team came in first winning regional finals as the only undefeated team, advancing to the state competition in March as well as winning the Innovate Award which is presented to the team that has demonstrated a strong combination of ingenuity and innovation in designing their VEX robot. She was also recommended by a school educator to be considered out of 1000+ students to be one of the 10 participants in Youngstown State Universities Master 3D Printer Operator Master Badge Course where she was accepted, got a free 3D printer, and learned how to construct a 3D printer, design objects, and completed a final design and print project to earn the certification. Outside of her STEAM work, Kylie has also participated in various school activities including Marching Band, Concert Band, French Club, Pep Club, Prom Committee, Destination Imagination, National Honor Society, YSU´s 3D printing master course as well as 4-H, Girl Scouts, Me to We, Girl Up, United Nations Leadership Program, and Interact where she serves as the Secretary. She has also found the time to accumulate 178 service hours, most of which come from her favorite volunteering activity: her local theater's Special Needs Program, where she helps actors with special needs learn lines, music theory, choreography, and is present during shows to feed lines to actors who need assistance. Kylie is also always looking to grow academically, as she takes college courses at Kent State University and has taken both AP English Language and Composition and AP United States Government, earning the highest score of 5 on both exams. In the future, Kylie plans on attending the University of Akron where she was chosen as a Williams Honors College Student with honors and academic scholarships majoring in Computer Science and Education! After college she hopes to work remotely and travel to national parks across the United States. She would love to work in mitigating the effects of climate change in big corporations and transportation, some of the greatest contributors to emissions, with Computer Science. She would also like to give back to the organizations and communities that have helped her along her STEAM journey by volunteering at both Girls Who Code and Built By Girls, as well as creating a non profit that raises money to donate to rural and underserved schools to help create and fund STEAM organizations and extracurriculars in them.