Temiloluwa Adeniyi

"When I was in 6th grade the Howard Hughes Foundation funded a Saturday science program that was targeting diversity and girls.  That summer I was one of five students chosen to go to an extension research program at Duke University. I did research on phage, viruses found in the soil. I discovered a new phage that is still being researched at the Pittsburgh Phage Institute. I knew from the 6th grade that I wanted to become a biochemical engineer.  I want to find the woman who ran the Saturday science program, her name is Rebecca and I'd like to thank her because  there are a lot of federally funded programs but there needs to be a bridge, a person who is dedicated to making a program happen and to making it diverse, she was that bridge.  Innovation only happens when you have diverse perspectives brought together in an integrative way to create a new strategy.  I want to use my STEM background for good, it's the social impact of my work that I am most interested in." -  Temiloluwa Adeniyi is a graduate student at Georgia Tech and she is the CEO/Founder of Nopneu, LLC which has developed Nopneu, a low cost- diagnostic tool for diagnosing pneumonia in a fraction of the time and cost of conventional methods. Temiloluwa was awarded $10,000 from Backstage Capital this week for winning the Pitch Black Competition at SXSW2018

Kelly D. Shapiro

"It's because I am a woman of color and graduated from an Ivy League school that Dolly Singh hired me to be general counsel for her company Thesis Couture Inc. My peers are the demographic for her brand."  - Kelly D. Shapiro is an attorney who provides legal representation and business counseling to clients in the entertainment, tech and start-up industry.

Jen Lee Reeves & Jordan Reeves

"The entire adventure Jordan and I are on started the day she born. I knew I would get her all the resources she needed. What I didn't know is that she would be bringing the resources to me." Jen Lee Reeves is the Founder of Born Just Right and is the mother of two children. "The boys won't pass the basketball to the girls at all unless the teacher tells them to. It's so annoying. But unless I am on an all girls team I don't ever get the ball.  And even then I don't get the ball that much." - Jordan Reeves is the Co-Founder and Innovator at Born Just Right. She is 12 years old and designed her own prosthetic arm that she is pictured with, which is a purple unicorn horn that shoots biodegradable glitter. She is currently designing another prosthetic arm for herself that has various tools on it, similar to a Swiss Army Knife.