School: St. Mary's University
    San Antonio, Texas, USA

2 students, ages 17,17 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on March 19, 2005. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): 2005,2005

Classes and Teachers: David Simon, Lucinda Simon, Karla, Amy

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.stmarytx.edu

1. Description of Our Team

Our Doors to Diplomacy team consists of three girls: Karla and Amy. Although we attend the different schools, we did manage to accomplish tasks by dividing the work to save time. Our coaches, Lucinda and David Simon, were there to guide us through the process by explaining the requirements, answering questions, keeping us focused and giving technical help on building web pages. However, we knew that we were responsible for the content and building our website.

2. Summary of Our Project

If you ask anyone to name some of the best leaders that come to mind, chances are you’ll hear George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Gandhi, or perhaps the great diplomat Andrew Young. What do all these people have in common? Some were Presidents, and others fought for Civil Rights. Guess again; they’re all men. So while men may be more recognized, what about the women? Why do we always have to hear HIStory? What about HERstory?

Our website focuses on great leaders that happen to be women. We define leadership characteristics and the values they must maintain to be successful. Women leadership positions are growing in number. We researched women in leadership who were recognized but virtually unknown to masses.

3. Our Computer and Internet Access

A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:more than 50%

B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:2-3

C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dedicated connection

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:more than 6

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

Every situation involves some sort of conflict. Unfortunately, we encountered three. Our major one was our lack of communication. Our exchanging of ideas wasn’t on a constant basis. Also, time management was crucial with other high school activities and one of our group members preparing to graduate. It seemed as if we were robbed out of many hours. Another setback was our unfamiliarity with creating and designing a webpage. With no prior experience the task was difficult and time consuming. The process was challenging but also beneficial.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

Our group now has a greater knowledge that women can become and are leaders in communities and around the world. Before beginning this project, neither of our teammates could name an inspiring woman leader to admire, but now after researching the many acknowledged and unrecognized women we can name many inspiring women leaders. But after all, an individual doesn’t have to be recognized for their accomplishments to be considered a great leader.

6. How did your activities and research for this CyberFair Project support standards, required coursework and curriculum standards?

Our activities in this project allowed us to understand the need to work as a team and manage our time. Our group came to a decision to assign individual assignments, which gave each person an opportunity to build research skills. As a team, we learned how to gather our thoughts and collaborate in order to build our website. The skills that we have learned gave us a better understanding that teamwork and team responsibilities cannot be overlooked.

1) What information tools & technologies did you used to complete your CyberFair project?

Much of our software and tools were provided by the St. Mary’s Upward Bound program, to include access to the University’s library. Some of the software and program tools we used were: Microsoft Word, Macromedia Dreamweaver, Macromedia Fireworks and the FTP Program. A few of our group members also used their home computers to complete their research. We used the internet to search for much of our content and to upload the web server with our web pages. Surveymonkey.com is an online tool we used to conduct an online survey.

2) In what ways did you act as "ambassadors" and spokespersons for your CyberFair project both on-line and in person.

We created a website to inform others of the many unrecognized women leaders of our world. Our web page will provide reference for those trying to find information on particular women leaders. We have also developed a questionnaire for visitors to fill out while exploring our website in order to find out how much people really know about this subject. The results that we obtain will give us an idea of how much others knew about women leaders prior to looking at our webpage. In the future we will continue to inform others about our website and hopefully they will see that women do play a major role in the world.

3) What has been the impact of your project on your community?

Our website, including an online questionnaire, created a sense of awareness within our community by having people openly express their opinions about women in leadership roles. At the moment the impact may be small, but in time it will allow more people to be exposed to women leaders and their traits.

4) How did your project involve other members of your community as helpers and volunteers?

Our coaches, David and Lucinda Simon, guided us in conducting our research and constructing our website. They allowed us to use our creativity to come up with a design for our website. We would like to thank Lt. Col. Consuelo Kickbusch for her interview, as well as, our website visitors for providing feedback on our survey and participating in viewing our research. Last but not least, we would like to thank Dr. Jacqueline Dansby, the director of the Upward Bound Pre-College Program at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, for giving us this opportunity to expand our opportunity to earn a college scholarship and for always believing in us.

5) Discoveries, Lessons and Surprises (Optional)

While researching, we learned that there are many women leaders of which we were previously unaware of. We learned how to collaborate in order to complete the overall project. We learned about the importance of time management alongside the effectiveness of patience. Our research strategies and analytical thinking skills improved with the task of building a myriad of knowledge and skills set. Finally, by underestimating the level of difficulty related to creating and designing a webpage, we were unaware of the great dedication it would take to complete the project. Fortunately our group was able to pull through and complete the website.