What It’s Like To Be The Only Female Electronic Engineering Student in the Room

How I learned to move beyond anxiety, nervousness, and self-doubt.

I distinctly remember the first day of the first course I took where I was the only woman in the room. We were twenty students, a few familiar faces and a couple of new ones, in a huge classroom at 7 a.m., unsure of what “mathematical methods” was all about.

That morning, the professor’s assistant told me that I’d have to get used to being outnumbered, that it’d be tough once I was with sharing classes with other women again, and that I would excel only if I tried my very best and ignored the awkwardness that comes with my chosen career.

I was indifferent to the idea of being surrounded only by men, but I managed to get everything done well and it ended up being one of the greatest courses I’ve had at college. The professor always seemed to appreciate my input. I was effective at problem solving, understanding concepts, and using the mathematical tools that would build my future in electronic engineering and communications.

And since then, the experience has never been the same.

Being an undergrad means spending time exploring new ways to get things done right — and at the right moment — as well as reading, testing, learning ideas not included on the syllabus, and for looking for help and guidance almost on a daily basis. (Okay, most of us are able to do that.)

Yet as a woman — and especially as a woman of color — people already have biased views on who you really are. It feels like it’s an ongoing competition with people’s ideas of black womanhood: you’re perceived as hypersexualized, loud and lazy until you prove otherwise.

And as a woman of color studying electronic engineering, or any STEM degree for that matter, an already difficult academic setting becomes even more challenging.

If you don’t realize it by your freshman year, you will eventually: My field has always been a boys club, and emotionally I felt like I had to prove — to myself and to others — that I was worthy and smart. The stakes felt higher for me since most of my male classmates have the privilege of a background in technical studies on electronics, while I had to learn all of it on my own. I hadn’t attended a polytechnic high school; many of them had.

So I often felt nervous, anxious, and doubted myself.

I took personality tests with a career counselor in an attempt to figure out if a career in electronic engineering was what I really wanted, or if I could even do it. I constantly hesitated, wondering whether my input was necessary, not knowing if I should laugh at the jokes shared in class, unsure whether I should be more open, analyze the solution’s guide by myself, or ask any questions. (I had plenty.)

A year later, I see in my classes that less than 10 percent of the people studying the same degree as me are women. I start to think about how it will be once I’m in the field. Once I’m researching or working for an enterprise, or even once I’m teaching others, will my capabilities be constantly tested? Will I strive for more? Should I?

In Santo Domingo, where I live, I have yet to see a woman giving a lecture on microwaves, signal processing, artificial intelligence, or even general automation or telematics. But thanks to the internet, I know women from all over the world are working really hard to create and join inclusive spaces where they can teach and encourage more women to participate.

I no longer feel completely threatened. It’s an ongoing process that requires questioning everything, concentrating on my needs, learning to feel comfortable with my decisions, searching for equilibrium between who am I now and what I want to achieve, and both giving and getting support from people like me — women who feel discouraged but are doing their best to change the way women are welcomed in both college and workplace.

I’ve rediscovered the excitement that came with that first course a year ago. I’m trying to engage with others during and after classes, to ask when in doubt, and to stop looking for approval.

I’ve encountered professors who still have narrow ideas about women and even narrower ones about women on this path. But instead of keeping quiet like I used to, I try to help them create a safe environment for discussion and sharing.

The professor’s assistant who once advised me to ignore the awkwardness also told me that my classmates were the people I’d work with in the future: These men and women would be my coworkers, and having a healthy bond with them was key. That idea is said several times each trimester, it’s a reminder. Now I don’t feel that being the only woman in the room is a burden.

I look at being in the minority as an opportunity to defy the paradigm and grow.