The Society of Women Engineers is the most successful nationwide platform that provides networking and mentoring opportunities to college and university STEM majors. In The Science Behind Graduating A Class With Majority Women Engineers, the associate department chair of the engineering department at Harvey Mudd says that one of the factors in the college successfully reversing the gender gap in engineering graduates is the presence of a strong local chapter of SWE. However, SWE has very stringent membership requirements, and although many community colleges have applied for a local chapter, there is only one that has been accepted so far. An internet search reveals that many community colleges have their own women’s engineering clubs, which speaks to the interest in having a mentoring network.

STEMLinks should be an attractive proposition for community colleges because a) it is free, b) it provides a platform similar to SWE to connect with mentors and c) it gives an opportunity for the college to do community outreach through STEMulate.