I'm absolutely committed to allowing people to make choices. But they only make choices if they're informed. Obviously I would never have chosen to be a mechanical engineer, because I didn't know what a mechanical engineer did when I was growing up.
What we're trying to do is provide very concrete information in such a way that it intrigues young women, and they say “I want to find out more about this.” We're not saying that you should be an engineer, you should be a scientist, or you should be brain surgeon. We're saying here's what it's about; why don't you try this? And then when you come to choose your career, you have information; you have knowledge that you can base your choice on.
I would just mention that there are so many systemic barriers. You were saying that a young woman doesn't put up her hand to provide the information that she might have that could be very useful to the discussion. This is one of the problems, that we're still socialized a little differently. We don't always meet the expectations of society, when in fact we are doing extremely well in the choices and careers that we're making but we don't push ourselves forward quite as much. That's a stereotype, but we know that it's still true. And it's quite important, in the engineering profession particularly.