NonTrads: Women Following a non-Traditional Path in Pursuit of a Technical Degree and Career

This was a really inspirational session. It started out off with all the women on the panel describing their path to where they are today and what they're doing. This included things like having to get out of industry to have kids, re-entering college for an advanced degree after many years, being in college almost perpetually, and many other things.

Every non-Trad has faced and are still facing significant challenges to get where they are today - which is why the "NonTrads" group was created - to build a support system for one another.

The session concluded with audience participants presenting a question or describing their non traditional career path. Many students were describing their "non traditional NonTrad" life - and explained some of the hardships they have faced or are facing. I've included most of the discussion on the notepage for this session.

Basically, the bottom line of this session:

• As long as you are passionate about what you do, everything will fall into place.
• Don't let other people discourage you from pursuing that passion!