A Pinay in the field of electronics engineering, Angelina talks about her ups and downs as a woman in STEM.
Angelina Aquino has had an admiration for math and the sciences since her childhood. As a young girl, Angelina would join math competitions, and it helped that her parents were both engineering graduates who were supportive of this passion of hers. “[My parents] fostered my curiosity about the world, explained new concepts well, and encouraged me to read books and watch documentaries,” says Angelina. Later on, she found herself in a community of like-minded people, particularly during the math competitions at which she would occasionally place and during her years at a science high school. It was then that she found her love for programming.
Angelina back in high school during a frog dissection during her Biology class. According to her, she was very much excited to dissect but obviously, the frog was not.
Although she initially thought she would pursue medicine, through her interactions with her teachers, she later realized that another field was more suited for someone as logical and critical-minded as herself. “I soon realized that I couldn’t imagine myself working in a field without problem-solving, where you encounter questions and are able to break them down into logical, step-by-step solutions.” Eventually, this led her to pursue studies, both a bachelor’s and master’s degree, in engineering.
Day 1 of the LT4All conference, with former DepEd USec. Dina Ocampo (center) and Prof. Rhandley Cajote (right).
Her current focus is called natural language processing, or NLP for short. Although people may not realize it, this is something they use daily. To put it simply, NLP makes use of language data, whether it be written or spoken, and this is often used to develop apps such as Siri or Alexa, Google Translate, search engines, spam filters, chatbots, speech recognizers–you name it! An interdisciplinary field, NLP pools together the fields of electrical engineering, computer science, linguistics, and many others.
Angelina in ISMAC 2019 with her father, who to her is “arguably the single greatest influence in my pursuit of STEM to date.”
Angelina hopes for this spirit of collaboration for the local science community since she believes this is how new knowledge is formed. “When you come across a question that hasn’t been answered before and you start finding new answers–now that’s science!” Because of this, there should be more opportunities for women in STEM. While she mentions that the gender gap in the Philippines is relatively smaller compared to other countries, nonetheless, it is a reality that must be overturned for the better. Throughout her years in engineering, she has often heard that this is a man’s field, yet she still persevered and succeeded despite society’s archaic views on the matter.
In the future, I envision women to be and feel as welcome in STEM as in any other discipline.
She has nothing but hope for Pinays in the sciences. “In the future, I envision women to be and feel as welcome in STEM as in any other discipline.” Her advice to young girls is to live curiously and keep asking questions. “Don’t let anyone ever think that you don’t have a place in this field. Like this year’s Nobel Prize laureates in Chemistry, Emanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna, you can be trailblazers in your own way.”
Angelina Aquino is currently a Teaching Associate under the Electrical and Electronics Engineering Institute at University of the Philippines. In her spare time, she enjoys singing and listening to choral music, as well as playing video games.
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