07/25/2026
Watching Aaron at YC Startup School has been an incredible experience. Seeing hundreds of founders, engineers, and builders in one place is inspiring.
It also brought back a familiar feeling.
I’ve been attending technology conferences and startup events for decades as a software engineer and now it is my first time being here as an educator and parent.
As I look around the room, I see that I am still one of the very few women here and definitely the only one over 25.
So much has changed in technology. AI is transforming the world. Teenagers are building startups that can reach millions of people. Yet some things seem to change much more slowly.
I don’t see this as discouraging—I see it as a reminder that we still have work to do.
Every time a girl tells me she’s “not a computer/math person” or “coding is for boys,” I think about rooms like this. The technology our children will use, build, and depend on should be shaped by people with different experiences, perspectives, and ideas.
In Easy STEM School, we want every student, and every girl, to know that they belong in computer science, AI, engineering, and entrepreneurship. The industry doesn’t need more people who think alike. It needs more people willing to build, question, and create.
I hope that when Aaron attends events like this in another 20 years, no one will notice who is in the room, because everyone will feel like they belong there.
