ARCS Foundation, Metro Washington Chapter (MWC) February 2024 Newsletter |
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Feb 3: Winter Membership Meeting, 5-8:30pm, Army & Navy Club in D.C.
Feb 20: Membership Coffee, 9:30 - 11am, Lubna Zahir home
Mar 4: Visit at University of Maryland, 10:30am
Apr 5: 55 Year Celebration/Eagle Award
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Excitement is growing as we continue planning to celebrate our scholars and our 55 years as an ARCS chapter! We hope you can join us on Friday, April 5 for an evening of fun and fundraising while honoring our Eagle awardee Dr. Renee Wegrzyn and celebrating our 55 year anniversary at the Army and Navy Club in D.C. Charlotte Knight and Chi Pham are leading this event. Many thanks to our members who have donated items for the in-person auction and to Mary Jo Ruane for organizing the auction.
All members are invited to gather at Lubna Zahir’s home on February 20 for a Membership Coffee and writing “ARCS Loves You” cards to the members we don’t get to see as often as we would like.
Finally, mark your calendars for the upcoming National All ARCS Conference scheduled June 6-8, 2024 in Chicago. All ARCS members, potential members, and scholars are invited. It’s a great opportunity to meet your ARCS peers from the other 14 chapters, participate in workshops about STEM and female leadership, and choose from several tours around town. The event will also include the 65th Anniversary Celebration of the founding of ARCS. Registration will be available later in February.
~Julie Hohl and Patty Sparrell, ARCS-MWC co-presidents
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55th anniversary scholar award campaign |
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We are still accepting donations to our 55th Anniversary Scholar Award Campaign. Though the competition ended, you can continue to make donations until our Eagle Award Celebration on Apr 5. Help us finish strong and ask your friends to help us surpass our goal of $20,075 to fund one graduate and one undergraduate scholar.
You and they can donate $5, $50, $55, $100, $500, $5,000, $15,000, any amount. Send checks, payable to “ARCS/MWC” with your name on the memo line, to:
P. O. Box 60868
10221 River Road
Potomac, MD 20859-0868
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Let's get together for an informal Valentines member coffee on Tues, Feb 20 from 9:30 - 11:30 am. We will meet in the lovely home of Lubna Zahir, 1014 Gelston Circle, McLean.
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55 year celebration/eagle award |
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Save the date: our ARCS-MWC 55 Year Anniversary / Eagle Award Celebration is on Fri, Apr 5 from 6:00 - 9:30pm at the Army Navy Club in Washington, D.C.
The theme is "Look to the Future of Science and Technology." Our Eagle Honoree will be Dr. Renee Wegrzyn, Director of Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) appointed by President Biden, recognized as one of TIME Magazine #100 NEXT.
Fantastic venue, amazing speakers, great celebration! Start spreading the word to family, friends and colleagues. Our goal is to have over 100 attendees, raise as much money as possible for our Scholar Fund and 100% participation from our members through ticket sales, donations and live auction.
Watch your email and mailbox for details and your invitation.
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ARCS forward national speaker series |
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ARCS Forward events are put together by ARCS national and are held virtually. These events are personal and intimate conversations between members, current scholars, and other outstanding scientists in all STEM fields.
The next ARCS Forward event is Thurs, Feb 8 at 12pm. ARCS Scholars Vincent Zabella (Orange County) and Michael Feffer (Pittsburgh Chapter) will discuss their research in artificial intelligence. Our very own, Elli Nesbitt is moderating.
Julie Hohl is hosting a watch party. Meet at Julie’s home, 7203 Capitol View Drive, McLean, at 11:30 am for a light lunch, then watch the ARCS Forward event together at noon. RSVP directly to Julie at jbzhohl@verizon.net
If you can't make it to Julie's and still want to participate, click here for more info and to register.
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As we celebrate our chapter’s 55th anniversary, we highlight Karen Finkbiner's involvement in ARCS-MWC.
Karen Finkbiner joined ARCS-MWC in 1996, after having been a member of the Los Angeles (LA) Chapter since 1994. Karen joined the LA Chapter when two friends who were members of that chapter offered to sponsor her for membership. Karen and her husband returned to the Metro Washington area after Lockheed, his employer, merged with Martin Marietta. She then transferred her membership to ARCS-MWC.
Karen was asked to be the chapter’s secretary immediately upon joining ARCS-MWC. She has served in various roles since then, including being co-president. The rest is history!
Karen’s proudest achievement is being co-president, and she is very proud of the recognitions bestowed upon her by ARCS-MWC. She received the “ARCS Loves You” award, an honor that ARCS-MWC no longer bestows. She was named an ARCS-MWC ARCS Light in 2017. Her fondest memories are the friendships she made with ARCS-MWC members and meeting the Scholars one-on-one at the annual university visits.
Karen thinks that science is a critical element of U.S. society and is of vital importance to America and the world. She is proud of the chapter’s mission and its success in meeting it. We thank Karen for her continued membership in ARCS-MWC and all her contributions to the chapter over the past 27 years!
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Rachel E. Gray – ARCS-MWC Chapter Scholar
1st Year Scholar, Masters Student, Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
George Washington University
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Research:
Research uses modeling and optimization techniques to understand the impact of integrating renewable energy generation and storage technologies into urban communities. The results establish combinations of these technologies such that communities can improve the efficiency, reliability, resiliency, and cost of generating and distributing energy.
Describe the expected benefit of your research to society:
As population density in cities increases and the climate continues to change, the need for reliable energy will become paramount. This research addresses how various energy technologies can work together to provide efficient, cheap, and secure energy to communities. This research will provide a platform for community members to explore different combinations of energy generation and storage technologies such that they can support their energy needs. Further this platform will help communities to reach their net zero emission goals through understanding the impact of technology changes and providing the needed specifications to implement the changes.
Indicate how an ARCS award might benefit your research:
This award would allow me to develop deeper technical, professional, and interdisciplinary skills that I otherwise would not be able to obtain from my education. I would use the award to attend conferences, workshops, and symposia, join professional organizations, and obtain additional training and certifications. Some of these include memberships and conference participation in the Association of Energy Engineers, the International District Energy Association, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, as well as the following certification: Certified Energy Manager, Distributed Generation Certified Professional, and Building Energy Modeling Professional Certification. These activities will expand my expertise within my field, which will guide my research and allow for my research to have a greater impact on the community.
Career objectives:
Develop district energy system modeling techniques that allow for the analysis of whole cities with advanced energy systems, which will improve the current level of accuracy and ability to understand these systems.
Translate my research, and the research of others, into effective urban development and energy policies, aiding the improvement of community energy security and cost.
Create energy curricula for college students and interactive energy informational resources for the general public that improve community energy literacy.
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Mazda Moayeri – ARCS-MWC Endowment Scholar
1st Year Scholar, PhD Candidate, Computer Science
University of Maryland
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Research:
I research the reliability of cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI), with an emphasis on making models more interpretable and robust to deployment settings. More specifically, I develop tools for understanding autonomous reasoning, discovering hidden biases, and debugging machine-learning models, centered around improving the trustworthiness and reliability of AI.
Describe the expected benefit of your research to society:
As the field of AI continues to rapidly develop, serious reliability risks have emerged, many of which are rooted in the fact that modern deep networks lack interpretability (i.e. the way they make decisions is opaque) and robustness (they often fail dramatically when deployed to settings slightly different than the setting the model was trained in). My research focuses on ameliorating these reliability risks, so that humans can trust AI and AI can realize its incredible potential sweeping across countless domains. I wish to develop interpretability tools that allow humans to learn from how AIs reason, potentially uncovering new underlying insights in any scientific discipline. Further, understanding what AIs can and can’t do opens the door for human-AI collaborations to flourish, bringing forth new technologies and opportunities for all of society. My robustness research aims to ensure these rapidly advancing technologies remain ethical and safe. Whether discovering hidden biases in AI or predicting failures before they occur, development of safeguards and mitigation techniques will be essential to the proliferation of responsible AI for human good. In summary, AI is incredibly powerful and can benefit countless fields, from medicine to art to science to economics, but before that happens, we need to make AI interpretable and reliable enough to where people trust it, and that is precisely what I am setting out to do.
Indicate how an ARCS award might benefit your research:
I am most excited to join a network of young STEM researchers across disciplines. As AI has the potential to help nearly all fields, getting the opportunity to learn more about the hopes and professional needs of various scientists would offer inspiration for how I can make my research the most impactful. I also hope to meet more scientists from underrepresented groups. I appreciate how ARCS explicitly promotes diversity, equity, and inclusion, and I would hope to find like-minded allies or scientists from genders, races, and socioeconomic backgrounds that are minorities in STEM, a field which can often be exceedingly homogeneous. Sharing solidarity, learning from each other, and promoting one another would be a key benefit of the ARCS fellowship.
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Check here for updates from the ARCS-MWC councils.
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Development: Our 55-day scholar award fundraiser is accepting donations! Details are above. Help us reach our goal.
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University Relations: Our first university visit is at the University of Maryland on Mon, Mar 4 and 10:30 am. Watch your email for details and registration.
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P.O. Box 60868
10221 River Road
Potomac, MD 20859-0868
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