OCC Hosts STEM Event

Ocean County College is hosting a free panel discussion featuring four women in STEM through WebEx on Wednesday March 31 from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m.

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. The four women who will be speaking are Dr. Sylvia Riviello, Dr. Cheryl Cooper, Cristy Richards and Tanya Moore. It will be moderated by OCC’s professor of Engineering, Pam Bogdan.

Riviello is the Dean of the School of STEM at Ocean County College and will discuss the Science aspect in the panel. Riviello worked as an engineering manager She graduated from Bryn Mawr College with a Physical Chemistry degree and after that point consistently taught at many universities and two-year institutions including Rosemont College, Neumann University, Broward College and many others.

The Technology part of the panel discussion is being done by Dr. Cheryl Cooper, an expert in Telecommunication and Information Technology Security at both Sprint and T-Mobile corporations for 20 years. She is a Certified Information System Security Professional and a founder and president of Women in Security Mentors, Inc.

Cristy Richards will handle the Engineering discussion in the panel. Richards is the President and CEO of JAKTOOL, overseeing the quality and procurement departments. She graduated from Rutgers University with a bachelor’s and master’s in Mechanical Engineering as well as an MBA from Monmouth University. Richards has patents in the medical device industry and has worked at places such as, Osteotech, Inc. and Medtronic Spine and Biologics.

The math portion of the online panel will be done by Tanya Moore, the Managing Partner for Intersecting Lines and co-founder of the Infinite Possibilities Conference. Intersecting Lines is an organization that promotes equity and social impact in education, health and workforce development through analytics and impact evaluation. The Infinite Possibilities Conference is an event that supports, promotes and encourages underrepresented minority women in Mathematics. Moore graduated from University of California, Berkeley with a bachelor’s in Mathematics, a master’s in Mathematical Sciences and a doctorate training in Biostatistics.

Each of these women will discuss their journeys in becoming leaders in their respective fields and share their STEM achievements while acknowledging the challenges and rewards of being a leader.

To join the WebEx Meeting for the discussion panel, use this link at the start time of the meeting: https://ocean.webex.com/ocean/j.php?MTID=m2b4e068cf6a9d31e151df05112c4b948