A new leader has emerged: María Estela Godinez
Meet Maria Estela Godinez. She is 16 years old and like many girls her age she still has that shyness that is reflected in her smile and the look of her eyes. She smiles candidly and lowers the gaze as she says that she is nervous about what is about to happen in Cartagena, Colombia. Maybe she does have a reason to be shy, as she is about to address a group of the brightest leaders that influence IT&C policy in the Americas.
She has been invited here to participate in Craig R. Barrett’s keynote at the Digital Leaders Forum. Craig will urge the audience to “Expand what is Possible” and her story has a lot to do with this.
Maria Estela’s story began long before this week. She is currently studying high school in her hometown San Francisco del Rincón, México. San Francisco del Rincón is a small shoemaker town that is very close to the city of León in the state of Guanajuato, deep in the central area called El Bajío. She comes from a family of six and her mother is a single parent that takes care of the whole family. Maria Estela’s passion is electronics. She built a project about a year ago that later got transformed into something more meaningful over time.
Maria Estela built a glove that allows speech-challenged people to move their fingers in a similar fashion to Braille language and have those signals recognized by software that converts them into speech. She did it all by herself (hardware and software) with the help of teachers and mentors. She did such a great job that she went on to win three awards this spring at ISEF, the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair that Intel sponsors every year. Maria Estela won two awards for Computer Science (one in the individual category and another one in the overall category beating the winner in the group category) and won the IEEE award as well.
Maria Estela recalls how when they announced the winner in the first category, the announcer couldn’t quite pronounce the name of her town well. The person presenting the award said “San Francisco…” and hesitated to say “del Rincón”. In the mean time the San Francisco, California team began to scream and celebrate… only to hear her name as the winner.
She went on stage when Craig invited her up. The only truly familiar face in the crowd was her mother. She went on stage confidently and started to tell her story. She told Craig about her project and demonstrated how the electronic glove works. As she made every move everybody was fascinated with her story. Colombia’s Minister of Communications began to cry in her front row seat; deeply touched, as most of us were. We were all listening to every word she said. When she was done, we all cheered her with a warm ovation. She smiled candidly and went back to her chair, smiling with a different smile than before the keynote.
At the end of her presentation a new leader had emerged, the youngest of the leaders at the forum. She and Craig were very busy posing for pictures with the other leaders at their request. She had clearly stolen everybody’s hearts. In the end--- and it is not that difficult to understand why--- she showed everybody that expanding what’s possible is actually not just a cliché. It is quite simply what we all can aspire to when we are empowered by the right education, passion, and a strong determination to succeed.
Pictures:
Maria Estela before the presentation.
Maria Estela on stage explaining her project.
Maria Estela, her mom and Craig R. Barrett.
Maria Estela interviewed after the keynote explains her technology to a group of very interested journalists and conference participants.
Comments
Wow, my dad buys 'sombreros'for a couple of hat manufacturers in San Francisco del Rincon Guanajuato.
Next time I talk to him, I will mentioned to him that perhaps San Pancho (as my dad's call it) might in the future built not only sombreros, but perhaps high tech stuff.
As we will say in Mexico, 'me quito el sombrero ante María Estela'
Thanks Ricardo for a great posting.
Rgds,
Jorge
Posted by: Jorge Iniguez | September 20, 2006 05:10 AM
This is a story that need to be told in our country, where we are getting bad times because of politicians.
This make me get the confidence in our young people (I'm mexican of course) and somtehing to be proud of, after so many terrible and ashaming news about our country these last days.
I teach engineering and you gave me something to talk about in my clases.
I'd be very happy to have the visit of Maria Estela in our school;it could be the best way to encourage the students to work hard and with confidence to reach the accomplishments they dream.
A beatiful story indeed Ricardo, and sorry for my english because I know it's not very good.
Posted by: Lino Coria | September 20, 2006 09:14 AM
What a wonderful story, Ricardo! Thank you for posting it along with the pictures of this marvellous young girl!
Posted by: Angela K | September 20, 2006 04:00 PM
Wow! one in a million.
Posted by: Mask | September 21, 2006 10:53 AM
Ricardo,
Muchisimas gracias por avisarme sobre esto. Es un excelente articulo de verdad.
Es impresionante el talento y el esfuerzo de Maria Estela.
Muchos saludos!
Posted by: Raquel | September 23, 2006 06:32 PM
estoy muy orgulloso de esta chica no solo por el hecho de haber obtenido el primer lugar si no porque la conosco y se lo luchadora que es simpatica,confidente,amable y sobre todo muy amigable te queiro mucho amiga estelita sigue asi y lograras mucho mas.... tu amigo mario velarde
Posted by: mario velarde | October 9, 2006 01:33 PM
Ricardo, I actually met Maria Estella through a friend of mine (Sergio Espinola)who is an English teacher in San Francisco del Rincon. I have family there (plus I used to live there)and was helping to teach her english (for a brief week)before she came out to the U.S. for the Intel Science/Engineering Fair. She was telling me about her science project then my friend told her that I worked at Intel and she got all excited and got very nervous. A year before that I also met another student and teacher from San Francisco del Rincon who came to the 2005 ISEF here in Phoenix. It's good to see these young and aspiring students from such a small town (known mostly for making sombreros and shoes) compete on an international level.
Posted by: Sean Torres | October 11, 2006 05:21 PM
WOW!!! bien por aquellos jóvenes que destacan de esta manera. Tienes su email?? gracias por compartir.
Posted by: Lisbet Nieto | January 10, 2007 12:22 AM
Viendo tus archivos me encontré con este post. ¡Impresionante! Como ingeniero en sistemas puedo apreciar que lo he hizo no son enchiladas.
Me da mucho gusto que haya sido de una ciudad más chica y que haya sido una mujer mexicana.
Posted by: Chiva Congelado | July 18, 2007 05:22 PM
Me encontre con este blog, y en gral me gustó mucho, la noticia de esta chica, super chica !! si es para darse a conocer, ojalá y nos pudieramos concentrar en estos temas y dejar de lado la política. Esto nos anima y nos llena de orgullo a todos, nos recuerda que México tiene un futuro prominente. Mi más sincera felicitación.
Posted by: Selene | August 5, 2007 04:52 PM
Maria Estela,
I'm very proud of you! I know that what your have achieved is not easy especially at your age. I work in Santa Cruz California in a company that makes headsets. I work in the new product development materials and purchasing. I know first hand how hard it is to develop with a team of people and you did it with very little resources. Secondly, I'm also proud because you are my paisana. I was also born in San Francisco Del Rincon and wish that I never let and could have accomplish what I accomplish here in the USA,
Clara Chagolla Saldana de Flores
Posted by: Clara Flores | October 8, 2007 11:32 PM
WEll first of all diz is my family dat girl who built them is my cuzing her mom is my aunt
Posted by: Jose Sevilla | April 20, 2008 09:14 PM