Women in STEM (WiSTEM) at UT Austin hosted my retirement party on the afternoon of Wednesday, April 1, 2026, at the 1972 Pub on Guadalupe. Reflection Part 1 is easy. I’ll just share a couple of photos (WiSTEM staff with my amazing WEP and WiSTEM t-shirt quilt retirement gift with shirts across the past 25 years; and the STEMinist shirt I wore at the party). And I’ll share the speech I wrote… which is not exactly the same as the speech I delivered, as I’m not great at following scripts exactly as written (which is likely no surprise to anyone who knows me). More reflections with some cool “the stars were aligned” moments to come.

My Retirement Speech….as originally written

Wow. I look around this room, and I honestly don’t know where to begin — so I’ll start with gratitude.

Twenty-seven years. Twenty-seven years at UT Austin and 25 years advancing gender equity in STEM at UT Austin. And honestly? It went by in a flash of STEM events, grant proposals, legislative battles, late nights, countless weekends, and thousands and thousands of students who made every single hard day worth it.

I want to start by thanking my family — my husband James, who has been a patient supporter and advocate through all of it. I left a great job at Dow Chemical to come to UT, and he followed me here to Austin, leaving his great job at Dow Chemical in a leap of faith. Every fundraising push, every campus reorganization, every moment I came home exhausted and fired up at the same time — you were there. And my kids, Kale and Zane — they grew up watching me pour myself into this work, and I hope what they saw was someone who believed, deeply, that this work mattered. I will always remember yelling from the bathroom one day for someone to bring me a screwdriver when the cabinet door had come off its hinges. Zane, probably 5 or 6 at the time, peeked in, I asked for the screwdriver, and he just shook his head and said, “you aren’t like most moms.” Very true!

Now — I know some of you might have expected me to show up today in something a little more… retirement-party. But if you know me, you know everything I do has a strategy behind it. So let me tell you about this outfit.

This t-shirt, these capri pants, these tennis shoes — this is the uniform. This is what I wore for about 80% of the work over the past 25 years. Event-ready. Ready to haul wagons across campus, hoist banners and signs, lead campers on tours, set up for STEM Girl Day at 6am. And just in case anyone in this room is still unclear on who I am and what I do — the t-shirt takes care of that. It has a definition on it. I’ve always believed in being clear about your mission.

The earrings are doing a lot of work today, too. You might just look at these and see a rainbow — and that is important. These rainbow colors represent our LGBTQIA+ community, another community historically excluded from STEM spaces, and one our gender equity work has always sought to support and include. But there’s a second layer: these are spectroscopy earrings, picked up at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, adventuring with Zane on his last spring break. Spectroscopy — the precise analysis of light to decode the universe. Now, I took chemistry in the late 80s, when spectroscopy was a slow, painstaking, manual process. I will say — it is absolutely not slow anymore. Modern spectroscopy with AI has cut measurement time by 80%. Science moves fast these days! But back then? That exact, deliberate precision was not my speed — and honestly, it’s still not. It perfectly explains why I’m an engineer and not a scientist. I like to move fast, approximate, be thoughtful and strategic, and get things done. Engineers get things done. But even on vacation, even in leisure, STEM is just always there in my world. It was present at home during “Project Thursdays” throughout elementary and middle school summers, in the dinner table conversations, in the questions my boys asked and the things they built — and now both Kale and Zane, and honestly a lot of their friends, are pursuing STEM careers. Kale is a chemical engineer at Valero south of Houston. Zane graduates in ChE from Texas Tech in May and heads to Samsung here in Austin. Maybe they had no choice with both James and me being ChEs too! But they and their friends were also shaped by this work, testing out hands-on activities at home, constantly reminding me that boys are different from girls and that everyone needs their own spaces and places to experience STEM and thrive.

And finally — this necklace. My Scorpio necklace. My grandmother gave this to me so long ago in my childhood that I genuinely don’t remember the moment. I wear it today to honor all of the strong women who came before me, paved the way, and stood alongside me through all of these years — in my family, in WEP, in WiSTEM, in my amazing corporate and community collaborators and friends, and in my Resistance Ladies, who came together as elementary school working moms, bonded through political crises, and have supported each other through everything our lives and careers have thrown at us. My sister is here today, and she is part of that lineage too. This necklace is for all of them.

Okay. Now you know what I’m wearing and why. On to 27 years.

When I came back to UT Austin in 1999, I had a simple goal: follow my passions and make a difference. When I started with the Women in Engineering Program in 2001, 22% of first-year engineering students were women. By 2021, we’d reached 34% — the highest in Cockrell School history. Numbers aren’t everything, but those numbers represent real people who found a community, built confidence, and went on to change the world.

And then there’s STEM Girl Day. What started in my first year with WEP 25 years ago as a small Engineers Week outreach event for 90 students has become the largest STEM outreach event of its kind in the world, reaching over 12,000 kids annually. Over 118,000 K–8 students to date. Countless families who told us later that a single afternoon changed the course of their daughter’s life. That is why we do this.

And if anyone here is feeling generous tonight… WiSTEM still needs you. That’s my official fundraising plea. You know me — I never miss an opportunity.

To Ana Dison — where do I even start? You were my partner, my co-conspirator, my fellow dreamer. WiSTEM didn’t just happen — it started as a “what if” conversation between the two of us. We crafted the plan, made the case, pitched it to anyone who would listen, and somehow we built something that has touched tens of thousands of students across this campus and across the state. None of that exists without you. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.

I also want to thank Dr. LaToya Smith and the entire DDCE community — you embraced us and helped us launch something truly special.

To my research center colleagues, thanks for trusting me to join your team and to bring an equity, inclusion, and broadening participation lens to the important work you have done and continue to do.

To the WiSTEM team — you are passionate, curious, and creative. You are student-focused in ways that give me so much hope. I’m not really leaving — I’m just moving to your volunteer lists. You’re stuck with me as your loudest advocate.

So what’s next? I’m not done. Not even close. I’m relaunching the Texas Girls Collaborative Project — bringing together communities across Texas to keep advancing gender equity in STEM, freely, fully, and without restraint. I’m also doing project management work with WeTeach_CS, helping grow the number of certified computer science teachers in Texas high schools. Because the work continues, just from a new vantage point.

I started this journey as a chemical engineering student, answering phones and starting programs like the Evening with Industry Banquet in the WEP office in 1992. I leave as someone who has had the extraordinary privilege of helping shape what this university looks like for women in STEM for a quarter century. I am so proud of what we built together.

To everyone in this room — thank you for being part of this. See you on the next road.