Amanda Southworth, Archika Dogra, and Samantha Konigsberg: Three Women Using Their STEM Skills to Empower Their Communities
Women in STEM
Trigger warning: This article talks about depression, suicide, sexual assault, and r*pe.
Women make up roughly 27% of the workforce in STEM and 25% of the workforce in computing. While these statistics may seem staggeringly low, they mark a vast improvement from when these fields originated. In a world that seems to have been designed by men for men, three young women took it upon themselves to take on tech, a male-dominated industry, and make a real impact on the world around them.
Amanda Southworth, Archika Dogra, and Samantha Konigsberg are pioneering a new generation of women who are focused on changing the narrative of tech entrepreneurship.
“It’s unfortunate that we have to be the change, but it cannot happen without us,” Samantha remarks. “There are two roads you can take. You can either hide from that because it's hard and exhausting. Or if you want to lead a better path for people in the future, prove them wrong.”
Amanda Southworth struck inspiration while grappling with her own mental health problems, recognizing a clear disconnect between the resources available for mental health assistance and the needs of real people who are struggling. “I remember having a panic attack one day and opening up the App Store, trying to find an anti-anxiety app. I downloaded one and it wanted me to pay $200 a year. I was like, ‘I'm just depressed at 13, trying not to die. I don't have $200.’’' After this harsh confrontation with the sheer lack of available mental health resources, Amanda created her first app, titled Anxiety Helper, in hopes that people in similar circumstances would be able to find inexpensive assistance. From there, Amanda founded and continues to build Astra Labs, a youth-run nonprofit through which she continues to create software that helps marginalized communities. She continues to be inspired by how technological advancement has enabled organizations such as hers to create more cost-efficient resources through programming-based solutions.
Samantha Konigsberg knew from the start she wanted to create a safe space for the chronically ill community to be able to connect and share their experiences with one another. After being diagnosed with intestinal neuronal dysplasia and other chronic illnesses, she began a process of surgeries and recovery that consumed most of her middle school years. “I started to realize A, how extremely isolating that is, and B, how glorified the sick teen life is in the media,” Samantha recalls, contrasting the romanticized view depicted in movies like The Fault in our Stars to her own experience with chronic illnesses. Samantha was lucky to have her mom by her side, but was heartbroken when she realized how generally isolating the entire journey is, removed from most friends and loved ones for extended periods of time. Samantha is now a 20-year-old college student and the founder of the iPhone app inVISABLE, which connects the chronically ill community.
Archika Dogra, who has always loved humanities, felt a strong disconnect between the STEM and humanities fields that she wanted to mend. After attending a program at Stanford through which she started seeing how STEM and humanities could intersect, she began building a nonprofit called Innoverge for students from historically underrepresented backgrounds in STEM education. “We teach STEM skills that will help you achieve your goals and can amplify the work that you're doing in a meaningful and positive way. I wish I'd learned it like that when I was younger so I hadn't been so disillusioned with [what technology can do],” Archika explains. Alongside a team, Archika created a STEM X module that allows students to see how STEM and the humanities, typically seen as polar opposites, could intersect to create more meaningful outcomes. Archika, currently an 18-year-old college student, continues to serve as executive director of Innoverge. The nonprofit now has over 30 chapters in 12 different countries, bringing STEM education to over 5,000 students from underrepresented backgrounds.
Samantha Konigsberg, photo courtesy of Samantha Konigsberg
As their ideas have taken off and come to fruition, these three women are constantly pushing for new ways their skills can be used to build impactful solutions. “One of the good things about the autistic brain is it's very adept at pattern matching,” Amanda explains. “I actively go out and read and do stuff that purposely makes me uncomfortable so that I can make apps about it. So, those little projects on their own over time build up to be like much bigger projects.” When Samantha is brainstorming a new idea, she asks everyone she can for their input. She places a strong emphasis on a diversity of perspectives and is particularly grateful for the help she received with the legalities involved with putting an app on the App Store, which is an intimidating obstacle young people often face when trying to develop programs on a greater scale. Archika, much like Amanda and Samantha, focuses heavily on human experience to inspire her curriculum. “When I initially thought about brainstorming, it felt like there had to be a methodology. For me, it's definitely been very experiential. I went to see what I felt was currently missing from my traditional education system. And then we got input while working in these workshops, seeing what students like and don't like,” Archika expands. All three allowed human experiences, both of their own and the people around them, to discover pain points in their surrounding communities and how they could use their STEM skills to address them.
Amanda says, “Although my development and career have been greatly affected by my gender, another autism component is that we don't understand social cues. So I don't understand traditional gender roles. People would be like, ‘Oh, you can't work in STEM.’ And I'm like, ‘Why?’”
Despite their successes, they have also had experiences with gender disparities and sexist behavior in their educational environments. The first steps into male-dominated spaces are often most intimidating, such as walking into a computer science classroom only filled with boys, and it can be difficult to ignite a passion for a field in which you feel like an outsider. Archika points out, “There's a reason why these environments are so toxic; it's because boys are learning the same thing that we're learning in a different way, like from that position of power, right? We're learning that STEM isn't a place for us. They're also in a way learning that STEM is not a place for women.” Problems persist, of course, both with people who are close to us and people through a screen. As Amanda worked in the robotics lab, she recalls hearing a constant stream of jokes sexualizing women and even had a male peer approach in the dark in a “joking” manner, “I'm gonna r*pe you with the lights off in the room.” In the years following, everything from unsolicited, inappropriate emails, which she received at only 15 years old, to violent videos sent to her through Facebook forced Amanda to develop an action plan for future attacks on her and her team. In spite of the progress the field has made, “50% of women said they have experienced gender discrimination at work” in the year 2020, and this statistic only climbs when reporting the experiences of women of color.
Archika Dogra, photo courtesy of Archika Dogra
It is necessary to face the truth that within any male-dominated space, there is more often than not a woman who struggles to find ease amongst coworkers and gender discriminatory practices ranging from the subtle to the blatant. Overcoming the multitude of boundaries in the field can be a physically and emotionally exhausting journey. Finding support in a group of people they feel both safe with and inspired by has allowed these young women to not only persist but flourish in their respective ambitions. Samantha describes her time at the summer program Kode with Klossy as a “room full of girls who are so about what they do and there's not a single male in the room to tear them down.” Archika reminisces how she “finally understood what tech for good really was and what the definition of a sisterhood was” while attending her Stanford coding camp. The value of a safe space in such an intimidating field cannot be underestimated, and it is often the absence of this kind of awareness that turns so many women away from STEM in the first place. Amanda, who reiterates her gratefulness for a diverse, loving team at Astra Labs, emphasizes the true merit of a team in which everyone feels comfortable. She notes, “It's not that women aren't interested in STEM. It's that women don't feel comfortable in STEM spaces because, well, because men.”
Archika points out, “There's a reason why these [STEM fields] are so toxic; it's because boys are learning the same thing that we're learning in a different way, like from that position of power, right? We're learning that STEM isn't a place for us. They're also in a way learning that STEM is not a place for women.”
Samantha Konigsberg’s workspace, photo courtesy of Samantha Konigsberg
In spite of every barrier, Amanda, Archika, and Samantha were able to delve into a field they were truly passionate about and use their skills to positively transform their communities. Every day, women in STEM continue to face obstacles. Amanda specifically considers herself an anomaly that highlights how dramatically social pressures can influence gender disparities throughout the field. “Although my development and career have been greatly affected by my gender, another autism component is that we don't understand social cues. So I don't understand traditional gender roles. People would be like, ‘Oh, you can't work in STEM.’ And I'm like, ‘Why?’” Regardless of how others perceived her, Amanda remained uninhibited by the lack of female representation since her first day in robotics, and since then has continued to pursue her curiosity and passion. While women in STEM continue to struggle with imposter syndrome, they know that there is a space for them in the STEM fields—and if there’s not one, they’ll create one. “It’s unfortunate that we have to be the change, but it cannot happen without us,” Samantha remarks. “There are two roads you can take. You can either hide from that because it's hard and exhausting. Or if you want to lead a better path for people in the future, prove them wrong.” Amanda, Archika, and Samantha have all taken it upon themselves to lead that path.
STORY JAMIE YI
COVER GRAPHIC JANICE KIM