PRESS RELEASE
Houston, Texas – Black Girls Do Engineer recently signed an Educational Partnership Agreement (EPA) with National Security Agency in an effort to continue to play a key role in developing scientific and technological talent for possible national security challenges.
The National Security Agency (NSA) partners with select universities and nonprofit organizations as part of the Agency for Minority Serving Institutions’ (MSI) Hacking 4 Intelligence (H4I) program. It is a program in which the U.S. government and industry partners work together to solve national security problems. The program involves HBCU students and undergraduate students studying STEM disciplines.
Black girls are engineersa 501c3 nonprofit organization that provides access, education, and resources to Black K-12 students in STEM disciplines was selected to participate due to its excellent reputation for hosting groups of students from various STEM subjects, including programs mixed HBCU and High School, using Microsoft technology to do so.
The NSA H4I Collaborative Program offers students the opportunity to cultivate essential skills by deconstructing and analyzing NSA and Microsoft issues, all while collaborating and networking with government and industry partners. Students will form interdisciplinary teams and work to solve real-world problems at the NSA and Microsoft. At the end of a 12-week cohort, students leave the program with a minimum usable product ready for implementation.
“This partnership with NSA will allow our program to deliver our cybersecurity resources and curriculum to higher education institutions through our developed BGDE digital infrastructure powered by Microsoft tools,” says Kara Branch, founder and CEO of Black Girls Do Engineer.
Black Girls Do Engineer’s licensed STEM curriculum is committed to excellence in cyber defense training and research. Some of its programs include cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, data science, and a variety of technical training courses. Higher education programs include their Badge A Thon design event offered to college students.
“This collaboration will allow our national impact to reach new heights with students in higher education,” concludes Kara Branch, founder and CEO of Black Girls Do Engineer.
About black girls who are engineers
As the nation’s fastest-growing program for Black girls in STEM, BGDE has been nicknamed “The Ivy League of Nonprofits.” The program is application based and offers full-time, enrollment-based STEM camps and workshops to Black girls in grades K through 12, with one-on-one tutoring and workshops offered to college students through age 21. The program currently has a 100% college acceptance rate and 100% job placement rate. rate among its members. Since its launch in 2019, BGDE has served 4,000 girls through its program. The nonprofit also helped secure $44,000 in STEM-related college scholarships for its members.
BGDE’s futuristic curricula include: artificial intelligence, energy, audio/video, aerospace, engineering, medicine, robotics and coding. Mentoring includes: college preparation, financial literacy, upskilling, and mentorship from professionals working in these fields offering real-life experiences.