Beth Beck excels at taking the "scary" out of a hackathon.   Especially for first-timers who have questions.

Beth is the Open Innovation Program Manager, in the Office of the Chief Information Officer at NASA.  In 2015, she started researching a problem with NASA's International Space Apps Challenge.   The issue: very few women were participating in this weekend-long free event, aimed at solving the world's problems through data and collaboration.

The reasons behind the shortage of female participants led Beth to create a novel solution.

"NASA Data Bootcamp" is an introductory all-day event, aimed at acquainting hackathon newcomers with coding, problem-solving and making.  Attendees can ask questions, while getting comfortable with the concepts.  (There's no such thing as a "silly" question, in one of these!) And while a number of the 2016 NASA Data Bootcamp participants were women, there were quite a few interested men in attendance, as well.

During the 2016 Women's Data Bootcamp at Pasadena's Cross Campus facility in April, Beth talked about her background, the experiences that led to creating NASA's Women's Data Bootcamp and her thoughts on innovation and creativity as they relate to creating the future.
In this episode of Over Coffee®, you'll hear:

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How Beth's background nurtured her disruptive-thinking perspective and talents;

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How the 80-20 ratio of men to women in Space Apps led to the creation of Data Bootcamp;

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How Beth's research findings laid the foundations for engaging more women in Space Apps;

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Some new Space Apps participants' experiences, after Data Bootcamp;

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Beth's recommendations for girls' education for their future careers;

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Some resources for new coders, to learn coding;

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Beth's observations about the reasons women may hesitate to try something new;

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The trends she sees for innovators on the cutting edge of something new;

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How Beth's current dissertation explores innovation and creativity;

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Why chaos and a difficult innovative process are okay;

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How the Data Bootcamp has grown since its start in 2015;

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Some new Data Bootcamp tools for 2016.

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AND--a new NASA innovation for "citizen scientists", now that 2016 Data Bootcamp has concluded!