At The Social Engineering Project (TSEP), our impact is built on the dedication of leaders who give generously of their time, talent, and resources to ensure our students and programs thrive. Today, we honor and extend our deepest gratitude to two extraordinary board members whose service helped shape the foundation of TSEP as we know it: Cedric Fernandes, Vice President of Software Engineering at GoPro, and Kevin Daigneault, Senior Staff Chief Engineer at Northrop Grumman Corporation.

After seven years of service, Cedric Fernandes concludes his board tenure having left an indelible mark on our organization. Cedric brought not only strategic insight, but also an unwavering belief in experiential learning and youth empowerment. One of his most transformational contributions was helping to organize and bring GoPro to support our first-ever TSEP Overnight STEM Camping Conference—a milestone moment that elevated the experience for our students and set a new standard for immersive, hands-on learning.

Cedric’s leadership, creativity, and commitment to innovation helped position TSEP as a bold organization unafraid to think differently and aim higher for the young people we serve.

With nearly nine years of board service, Kevin Daigneault has been a cornerstone of TSEP’s growth and sustainability. Kevin was instrumental in securing critical early-stage funding that allowed us to move from vision to execution during our formative years. He also played a pivotal role in cultivating our long-standing corporate partnership with Northrop Grumman, opening doors that expanded our reach, credibility, and national footprint.

Kevin’s strategic guidance, steady leadership, and deep commitment to building smart, scalable infrastructure helped ensure that TSEP was not only impactful—but built to last.

Together, Cedric and Kevin represent the very best of board leadership: visionary, committed, action-oriented, and deeply invested in community impact. Their collective contributions have helped launch new programs, strengthen corporate partnerships, elevate student experiences, and build the organizational backbone that supports our mission today.

On behalf of our students, families, partners, staff, and the entire TSEP community--thank you, Cedric and Kevin. Your legacy will continue to live on in every student who finds confidence in STEM, every classroom we serve, and every community we impact.

Though your board service chapters close, you will always remain a part of the TSEP family. We are excited to see what the next chapters hold for each of you—and we are forever grateful that part of your journey was written with us.

With appreciation and respect,
​
The Social Engineering Project Board & Leadership Team

Direct Line: (415) 490 – 8010                @SocialEnginProj                 [email protected]
 
                                                     FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
                                                               July 7, 2022
 
First In-Person Summer STEM Camp at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory Since the Pandemic

PALO ALTO, CA (July 7, 2022) – Monday will mark the first day that underrepresented middle school-aged students of color will step foot at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (“SLAC”) since 2019. The Social Engineering Project (“TSEP”), Stanford’s Graduate School of Education (“SGSE”), and SLAC have partnered to bring the 10th installment of Science In The City (“SITC”), a weeklong science, technology, engineering, and math (“STEM”) camp. SLAC has designed a low-cost, traditional STEM, summer experience for incoming fifth and sixth-grade underrepresented students of color (African American/Black, Chicano/Latino/LatinX, Indigenous/Native American, and Pacific Islander). Transportation is provided from the East Bay and back daily.
 
The purpose of SITC is for students to fall in love with math, science, physics, and chemistry. By doing so, they have a higher probability of going to college, majoring in a STEM-related major, and working in the tech industry to improve their families' and communities' quality of life.  This year’s curriculum will focus on the physics of basketball, magnets, roller coasters, straw bridges, and cell phones.  Moreover, students will tour the Lab and the accelerator control room, interview researchers, scientists, and engineers; and present what they have learned in a presentation on Friday.  This life-changing experience will motivate and inspire these future scientists and engineers to discover the next element on the Periodic Table, cure cancer, and build the next rocket to take civilians to Mars.

 
SCIENCE IN THE CITY SUMMER STEM CAMP
DATES:                 Monday, July 11th through Friday, July 15th
TIME:                    9:00 am (PST) to 3 pm (PST)
LOCATION:          SLAC National Laboratory, 2575 Sand Hill Rd, Menlo Park, CA 94025
 
 
About
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org) is an Oakland-based social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through culturally relevant STEM related pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color.
 
About
The Science in the City research team (http://scienceinthecity.stanford.edu) at Stanford University is comprised of former science teachers who examine how to improve science teaching and learning in urban contexts. The Science in the City website provides a venue for students, teachers, and colleagues to exchange ideas and hear about new research findings.
 
About
SLAC National Laboratory, originally named Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, is a United States Department of Energy National Laboratory operated by Stanford University under the programmatic direction of the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science and located in Menlo Park, California.
 
Please find a video of news coverage from a previous years's camp here.
​
                                                                     ###

By Co-Founder, Kevin L. Nichols
​
OAKLAND, CA [May 31, 2022]  The lack of diversity in the technology industry disproportionately affects Black and Indigenous People of Color (“BIPOC”)’s access to generational wealth, high-income earning jobs, owning real estate, and owning stock in some of the most highly prolific companies in the world. Access to these technical career pathways starts as early as preschool, so equity in education is paramount in creating opportunities for BIPOC students to excel.  “Black and Latinx adults comprise roughly 30% of the United States population, yet only between 7% and 8% each of individuals employed across all computing and mathematical occupations (BLS, 2015) and across the high-tech sector (EEOC, 2016)” (Leaky Tech Pipeline Report, Kapor Center, 2018). To combat these statistics, I invented The Social Engineering Project, Inc., (“TSEP”) a Google and Microsoft-funded social impact venture with Stanford University designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through culturally relevant STEM pipeline programs for BIPOC students that lead to technical career pathways. I will validate TSEP’s accomplishments and evince its innovation. 

In April 2015, I attended an event organized by The San Francisco Foundation ("TSFF”), Policy Link, and USC's Program for Environmental and Regional Equity that indelibly changed my life.  One of the key takeaways was that the wealth and economic gap of BIPOC were growing exponentially since 1979, in part, due to the rising home prices near tech companies' headquarters and the better quality of education in the public schools in these zip codes because of their property taxes. Through gentrification, BIPOC families were forced to move out of these areas and send their children to either under-performing schools, home-school, or pay extra for private schools in order to remain competitive, which was inequitable.  At the conclusion of the event, the presenters stated that this condition would worsen significantly over the next 20 years unless something was done immediately to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry, which at that time was less than 3%.

As I digested the takeaways from the event, I recognized that this was a complex problem that required a systems thinking approach to solve.  In junior high school, I decided that I wanted to be a mechanical engineer and spent my summers and Saturdays at U.C. Berkeley’s Mathematics, Engineering, Science, Achievement (“MESA”) Program, attended Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, CT. and the Cherub Program at Northwestern University to study engineering and science. During my internship at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory as a mechanical engineering intern, I decided that I no longer wanted to be an engineer and wanted to be a civil rights attorney instead.  Although my plan was to work in a large law firm as a paralegal to observe how to run my own law firm one day, I decided that I did not want to be a lawyer either.  I ended up falling in love with the tech side of the legal practice and starting diversity programs in international law firms, and teaching personal branding, social media, and networking. After attending the 2015 TSFF event, I took advantage of an entrepreneurship course taught by Michael Bush, Founder & CEO of a Great Place to Work. The course taught me how to develop an impactful mission statement, select core values that I was passionate about, and approach solving a big problem using SMART metrics.  No matter how hard I tried to focus on starting a for-profit start-up company, I was haunted by the lack of diversity problem in the Bay Area and felt that it was a dereliction of my duty if I did not try to solve it. How do I motivate and inspire BIPOC students to persevere through the rigorous coursework of engineering and science, and change how the tech industry looks at talent and diversity at scale?

While pondering this question, a friend of mine from high school, Dr. Bryan Brown, who was a professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education, had previously approached me with an opportunity to assist his Ph.D. program. He developed a culturally relevant pedagogy that was designed to make BIPOC students fall in love with science and engineering and trains teachers on how to teach it at scale. Around 2013, Dr. Brown wrote a grant to the Nationals Science Foundation to train 10 students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (“HBCUs”) using this curriculum, and as a byproduct, they would run a week-long STEM camp called, “Science In The City”) for their final. For the first two years, all that Dr. Brown asked me to do was market the camp to get 50 BIPOC students to attend the camp for free, which was very easy.  After the grant expired and Dr. Brown resumed teaching full-time, we thought the tech industry and philanthropy would embrace a proven STEM camp at Stanford by providing financial support, however, we were wrong. We did not raise any money and did not have a Science In The City camp in 2015.  So, in 2016, I had the epiphany of creating an organization to address the lack of diversity in tech. I approached the vice president of compliance at Google to support our camp and he recommended that Google.org fund Science In The City and TSEP was born.

In the tech industry, social engineering means stealing passwords and conducting nefarious activities online. However, our name comes from a famous lawyer named Charles Hamilton Houston, who laid out the framework for the landmark Brown vs. Board of Education case, and said, “A lawyer is either a social engineer or a parasite on humanity.” Technically, I am not a lawyer or an engineer, but I look at the quote as, “You are either part of the problem or a part of the solution.”  TSEP provides culturally relevant STEM pipeline programs that motivate and inspire BIPOC students to fall in love with STEM, gain exposure to technical career pathways, and equip them with the tools to successfully navigate obtaining a tech job. I will highlight several of our most impactful programs: 1.) Science in the City - A weeklong day camp at Stanford that teaches 50, 5th and 6th grade BIPOC students math, chemistry, physics, and engineering; 2.) TSEP Overnight Camping Conference - a weekend-long outdoor camp that teaches 120 BIPOC high school students about work/life balance (hiking, mindfulness, yoga), tech careers (Northrop Grumman, Walmart Labs, GoPro, and Apple lead technical workshops on real projects that they work on at work), Entrepreneurship (pitch competition), college, and personal branding/networking (to leverage the relationships made with industry and classmates when they return); 3.) Global Hackathons - With the United Nations' Global Hackathon for Justice, we assemble the United States’ team to compete against teams from South Africa, Bolivia, Indonesia, etc.; and 4.) Youth Design Lab – Week-long summer camp for BIPOC high school students of color to learn design thinking with IDEO.  These programs are innovative because they not only incorporate a combination of work/life balance and the outdoors, but they go beyond offering computer science or coding solely. Our goal is to motivate students to excel in STEM so that they can have a wider variety of STEM majors to select.  Moreover, a good portion of our curriculum is developed by industry, for example, GoPro has led workshops on how their drones work and how to build and design their cameras, and Fitbit has led workshops on how the algorithms in their wearable devices convert signal movements into steps.  Finally, I teach our students the importance of personal branding and networking.  From 2011-2014, I was one of 4 high-end users featured on the LinkedIn login screen, thus over 250 million users saw me when they logged into the site.

In summary, “Innovative leaders understand that fulfilling their dreams to change the world means they’ve got to spend a significant amount of time trying to discover how to change the world.” (The Innovator’s DNA, Dyer 2019).  I built TSEP with the goal of encouraging BIPOC students to take matters into their own hands and pick themselves up by their bootstraps.  In doing so, I realized that I already have failed.  As tech companies export their workforce overseas for lower-paying wages and create hostile work environments filled with racism and microaggressions, I am leading BIPOC students to a well where their thirst will never be quenched.  When I increase my impact by working with large tech companies like Intel - who want to increase manufacturing domestically and create jobs for Americans in America and leverage my political connections through organizations like the Congressional Black Caucus – to positively impact domestic workforce policy to improve the working conditions for BIPOC, then, I will truly succeed, as The Social Engineer. TM

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
FEBRUARY 17, 2021
 
STUDENTS OF COLOR LEARN STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING THROUGH TSEP, LIFTECH, AND PORT OF OAKLAND PARTNERSHIP
 
OAKLAND, CA (February 17, 2021) – Since The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (“TSEP”) can no longer take the 100+ Black and Brown high school students of color from Oakland, San Jose, and Sacramento to the Santa Cruz Mountains to learn: 1.) Work/Life Balance; 2.) STEM Careers; 3.) Entrepreneurship; 4.) College Readiness; and 5.) Personal Branding/Networking due to the COVID-19 Pandemic; we will still host Part 2 of our Virtual Camping Conference from March 6, 2021 through March 20, 2021.
 
With so much emphasis on computer science, coding, and software, people often forget about the other letters besides the "T" in "STEM."  We need to prepare high school students of color to go college, pass their math, chemistry, and physics prerequisites, and major in other STEM disciplines, like engineering.  This 3-Week Saturday program led by Liftech Consultants will expose students to structural engineering principles with the goal of motivating and inspiring these students to attend college and major in an engineering major.  Week 1 will include an introduction of force, load, and structures.  Week 2 will introduce drafting and design principles and provide feedback on the students' bridges.  The final week will feature the bridge competition, other awards, and an overview of other engineering careers that they may be interested in pursuing in the future.


This program is open to high school aged underrepresented students of color nationwide and is free thanks to the Port of Oakland.  However, if individual donors would like to make a contribution to the success of this program, they may support our fundraiser here.  Students may register here. 


For more information, please visit http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org or email Kevin L. Nichols at [email protected].  
 
 
VIRTUAL CAMPING CONFERENCE PART 2 - Liftech Consultants
DATE:                 Saturday, March 6, 2021 through Saturday, March 20, 2021
TIME:                  9:00 am (PST) to Noon (PST) or Noon (EST) to 3pm (EST)
LOCATION:        Zoom
 
 
About The Social Engineering Project, Inc.
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org) is an Oakland-based social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM related pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color.
 
About Kevin L. Nichols
Kevin L. Nichols is the Founder, President & CEO of The Social Engineering Project, Inc., an Oakland based, social impact venture with Stanford University designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color and diversity, equity, and inclusion consulting for tech companies. Nichols has been featured on LinkedIn’s Hall of Fame, Yahoo’s Blog, in the Examiner, Black Enterprise, CNN Money, Reuters, MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. Millions saw Kevin while logging in to LinkedIn.com from 2011-2014. For more information and full CV and Bio, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.
 
About Liftech Consultants, Inc.
Liftech Consultants Inc. has provided structural engineering services since 1964. They have special expertise in the design of container handling cranes and other equipment. Their experience includes the structural design of wharves, floats, buildings, heavy lift structures, and other special structures.

  
Please find a video overview of a previous year's camp here. 

 OAKLAND, CA (November 2, 2020) – This time last year, The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (“TSEP”) took over 100 Black and Brown high school students of color from Oakland, San Jose, and Sacramento to the Santa Cruz Mountains to learn the following: 1.) Work/Life Balance; 2.) STEM Careers; 3.) Entrepreneurship; 4.) College Readiness; and 5.) Personal Branding and Networking at its 3rd Annual TSEP Overnight Camping Conference.  However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it would nearly be impossible to conduct a hands-on, experiential STEM related workshop for high school students.  Never say never…
 
On Saturday, November 14, 2020, Fitbit will lead two interactive workshops to motivate and inspire Black and Brown high school students to pursue STEM related careers.  The first workshop, “Operation Security 101: Protecting your privacy on Social Media,” will be led by Ann Hadley & Jonathan Werrett (members of Fitbit's Information Security team) who will demonstrate how bad actors use 'open source' intelligence to find out more about their targets and how students can better protect their online privacy.  The second workshop, “Converting Signals to Steps,” will be led by Alicia Kokoszka, Eric Friedman, Conor Heneghan, Paul Stetson, and Dan Howe (members from the Fitbit Research Team), who will illustrate how the sensors that make up the Fitbit deliver step counts, heart rate and other useful data to its users.  Moreover, the students will work collaboratively to build a clock face that allows them to visualize how Fitbit goes from sensor stream to digestible metrics on its devices.
 
The icing on the cake will be a welcome by Vice President of Global Talent Management & Inclusion, Jaison Williams, and workshop presenter, Eric Friedman, who is an actual Fitbit Co-Founder!  Students do not want to miss out on this opportunity!  Registration opens on Tuesday, November 3, 2020.
 
 
VIRTUAL CAMPING CONFERENCE PART 1 -FITBIT
DATE:                 Saturday, November 14, 2020
TIME:                 9:00 am (PST) to Noon (PST) or Noon (EST) to 3pm (EST)
LOCATION:        Zoom
 
 
About The Social Engineering Project, Inc.
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org) is an Oakland-based social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM related pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color.
 
About Kevin L. Nichols
Kevin L. Nichols is the Founder, President & CEO of The Social Engineering Project, Inc., an Oakland based, social impact venture with Stanford University designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color and diversity, equity, and inclusion consulting for tech companies. Nichols has been featured on LinkedIn’s Hall of Fame, Yahoo’s Blog, in the Examiner, Black Enterprise, CNN Money, Reuters, MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. Millions saw Kevin while logging in to LinkedIn.com from 2011-2014. For more information and full CV and Bio, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.
 
About Jaison Williams
Jaison Williams is VP of Global Talent Management for Fitbit, where he is a key member of the HR leadership team. He is responsible for Inclusion & Diversity, learning & leadership development, talent & performance management, and engagement.
 
About Eric Friedman
Eric Friedman is Fitbit’s Co-Founder and CTO. Previously, Eric served as an Engineer Manager at CNET Networks, as a Co-Founder of Wind-Up Labs, a founding engineer of Epesi Technologies, and a technical member of the Real-Time Collaboration Group at Microsoft Corporation. Eric holds a B.S. and M.S. in Computer Science from Yale University.
 
About Shawna Kovacs
Shawna Kovacs has spent 25+ years in the Talent & Organization Development world as well as the Technical Sales/Sales Management side for various technology companies including Microsoft, Pandora Radio, and most recently Fitbit, where she has been for 2.5 years as the Director of Talent & Organization Development. Shawna lives in Piedmont California and has a 17-year-old (senior) daughter.
 
About Paul Stetson
Paul Stetson grew up in the Central Valley, came to Berkeley for college, and has remained in the Bay Area ever since. He has over 25 years of academic and industrial experience in retinal imaging, pulse oximetry, and other areas of biomedical technology. In his work in the industry, he has been fortunate to also work with clinical academic groups to validate several product developments, generating over 50 academic publications and 26 patents. His work at Fitbit has focused on signal analysis for heart rate and exercise, and evaluation of tracker performance on kids.
 
About Dan Howe
Dan Howe is a Research electrical engineer at Fitbit who designs and tests new sensors for measuring health and activity. He studied electronics for medical devices at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. He enjoys running, biking, and weight lifting as part of maintaining a healthy lifestyle. As someone who was inspired to study engineering by a middle school robotics competition, he is looking forward to working with the TSEP students to help ignite a passion in technology.
 
About Alicia Kokoszka
Alicia Kokoszka is a Research Scientist at Fitbit, focusing on algorithm and hardware performance. She has her Master’s in biomechanics where she focused on the degradation of balance and stability with age. Her passion for healthy aging pushed her to apply her skills into industry to inspire individuals to live healthier lives.
 
About Jonathan Werrett
Jonathan Werrett is Head of Information Security at Fitbit and has spent 15 years helping a range of companies both build and break their security.
 
About Ann Hadley
Ann Hadley is the lead for Governance, Risk and Compliance and works with engineers to implement security as a first-class feature.

 
Please find a video overview of a previous year's camp here. 
 

                                                         NEWS RELEASE

Direct Line: (415) 490 – 8010                @SocialEnginProj                 [email protected]
 
                                                        FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
                                                                MAY 26, 2020 
 
Stanford Summer STEM Camp Goes Virtual During COVID-19
 
 
OAKLAND, CA (May 26, 2020) – Rather than scrap the 7th installment of our hands-on, culturally relevant STEM summer day camp during the COVID-19 pandemic, The Social Engineering Project (“TSEP”), Stanford’s Graduate School of Education (“SGSE”), and SLAC National Laboratory (“SLAC”) have partnered to bring Science In The City (“SITC”), virtually. Parents have been homeschooling for weeks and are worried that their children are missing out on substantive learning. In the past, a week-long camp at a top tier institution of higher learning, such as Berkeley or Stanford would cost ($600-$3,000 per week), however, SITC’s tuition is $350 per student and has a ½ off Memorial Day Sale until June 1, 2020.  Moreover, third party organizations typically rent out space at these college campuses, but are rarely curated by the institutions themselves.  For these and other reasons, Dr. Bryan Brown of SGSE, Kevin L. Nichols of TSEP, and Dorian Bohler and Margaux Lopez of SLAC have designed a low cost, traditional STEM,  summer experience for incoming 5th and 6th grade underrepresented students of color (African American/Black, Chicano/Latino/LatinX, Indigenous/Native American, and Pacific Islander).
 
The purpose of SITC is for students to fall in love with math, science, physics, and chemistry. By doing so, they have a higher probability of going to college, majoring in a STEM related major, and working in the tech industry in order to improve the quality of life of their families and communities.  This year’s curriculum will focus on weather, biotech (genetics), and exploring the most advanced research available on COVID-19.  Further, students will also interview researchers, scientists, and engineers; and have additional assignments to do at home if they choose for more exposure to the concepts taught.
 
After surveying our students, we have removed various barriers for students to participate thanks to the generous donations from the following companies:  
 
1. Hardship Scholarships – Northrop Grumman will provide scholarships for students experiencing economic hardships or that have been impacted by COVID-19;
​
2. Hardware – First Republic Bank will provide laptop computers for students who are experiencing hardships and/or do not have devices to participate with.

3. Lab Protection – Thermo Fisher Scientific will provide lab coats, gloves, goggles, and backpacks for our students.
 
SITC is open to incoming 5th and 6th grade students of color across the nation.  Enrollment is low due to the lack of financial resources that parents have and the ability to reach potential students to apply.  The registration deadline has been extended from June 1, 2020 to June 15, 2020. Lab materials and the appropriate applicable items will be mailed home to each camper.  If you would like to support SITC, please visit our online fundraiser and make a donation today. If you would like to register your child, please visit here.
 
 
SCIENCE IN THE CITY SUMMER STEM CAMP
DATES:                 Monday, July 13th through Friday, July 17th
TIME:                   9:00 am (PST) to Noon (PST)
LOCATION:           Zoom
 
 
About
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org) is an Oakland-based social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM related pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color.
 
About
The Science in the City research team (http://scienceinthecity.stanford.edu) at Stanford University is comprised of former science teachers who examine how to improve science teaching and learning in urban contexts. The Science in the City website provides a venue for students, teachers, and colleagues to exchange ideas and to hear about new research findings.
 
About
Kevin L. Nichols - Co-Founder, President & CEO

• Legal Industry Technology Executive with over 20 years experience
• Diversity Consultant and Expert for 20+ years
• Attended U.C. Berkeley, Executive Program for Social Entrepreneurship at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, and Fundraising Academy at JFK University’s Sanford Institute of Philanthropy Academy Certificate at JFK University’s Sanford Institute of Philanthropy. For a full biography and CV, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.

 
About
Dr. Bryan Brown - Co-Founder - Chief Education Officer

• Former High School Science Teacher
• National Academy of Education and Spencer Foundation Fellow in 2005
• 2007 winner of the National Association for Research in Science Education (N.A.R.S.T.) award
• Associate professor of science education at Stanford University and engages in research that explores how language and identity impact student learning.
• Bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences from Hampton University, a Master’s degree in Educational Psychology from the University of California, and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the U.C. Santa Barbara. 
  
  

About 
Dorian Bohler, M.S. – Engineering Physicist – SLAC

• Physicist, author, and advocate for educational equity.
• Research interests include developing electron beam diagnostic systems and investigating neural networks for machine learning applications in accelerator control system
• Attended Morehouse College, Georgia Institute of Technology, Wayne State, and Stanford University.

 
About
Margaux Lopez, M.S. – Mechanical Engineer - SLAC

• Commissioning engineer at the Rubin Observatory in La Serena, Chile.
• Supports the integration and testing of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) Camera with the telescope, including refrigeration system verification and camera maintenance facility construction.
• Technical curriculum writer, program director, and mentor for STEM outreach programs.
• Attended California Institute of Technology and San Jose State University

Please find a video of news coverage from a previous year's camp here. 
​
                                                                      -END-

​FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: October 20, 2019
 
CONTACT: KEVIN L. NICHOLS
Founder, President & CEO
The Social Engineering Project, Inc.
Phone: (415) 490-8010
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.TheSocialEngineer.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheSocialEngineerProject
Instagram: @SocialEnginProj
Twitter: @SocialEnginProj
 
Tech Companies Expose High School Students of Color to STEM Careers in the Outdoors
 
Oakland, CA (October 20, 2019) – The tech industry is full of stresses, misconceptions, elitism, cronyism, etc.  There is no direct pathway to enter the industry and once you get there, it is difficult to succeed without a lot of assistance.  This is why The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (“TSEP”) is hosting its 3rd Annual TSEP Overnight Camping Conference for high school students of color (“SOC”).
 
TSEP will take approximately 100 SOC to YMCA Camp Loma Mar in the Santa Cruz Mountains to learn about work/life balance; the environment; Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (“STEM”) related careers; entrepreneurship; college; personal branding; and networking.
 
Michael D. Thomas, Esq. (Of Counsel of Ogletree) and Juan Walker, Esq. (Sr. Corporate Counsel for Oracle) will lead mindfulness workshops; Lonni Rivera (reporter/journalist) and Lindsay Simonds (philanthropic fundraising consultant) will lead yoga classes for the work/life balance component.  Tech companies such as lead sponsor, Northrop Grumman (gears), Walmart Labs (paper coding), GoPro (cameras), and Apple (robotics coding) will lead workshops on the various technologies used in their day to day lives as engineers.  Then, the students will learn about pitch competitions and present why the workshop that they were assigned was the best and why for prizes.  Further, representatives from U.C. Berkeley, U.C. Santa Cruz, and San Jose State will discuss the application process, what college life is like, and why the students should attend.  Lastly, the students will learn about their personal brand and the importance of networking currently and in their future endeavors.
 
Kevin L. Nichols, TSEP’s Founder, President and CEO says, “These students will develop the skills necessary to be successful in tech or any other industry by setting good boundaries, knowing how to recharge, and how to go about achieving what they really want in life.”
 
For more information, please visit http://bit.ly/TSEPcc19.  The cost per student is $175, however, there are hardship scholarships for $50.
 
TSEP OVERNIGHT CAMPING CONFERENCE
DATES:                 Friday, October 4th at noon through Sunday, October 6th at 4pm
LOCATION:          YMCA Camp Loma Mar, in Loma Mar, California (Santa Cruz Mountains)
 
 
About
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. is an Oakland based Google and Microsoft funded social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through pipeline programs for underrepresented students of color.  TSEP’s sponsoring 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization is the YMCA of the East Bay while it awaits its own tax exempt status.
 
About
Kevin L. Nichols has worked in multifaceted capacities in some of the most prolific international law firms in the country, such as Morrison & Foerster, Paul Hastings, Heller Ehrman, and Holland & Knight. His interest in diversity and technology began while he was a mechanical engineering/diversity intern at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.  Later, he became the Executive Director of the California Diversity Council and the African American Wellness Project. Kevin has become a social networking expert and full-time consultant specializing in litigation technology (eDiscovery), diversity, and social media marketing for the legal industry.  Nichols has been featured on LinkedIn’s Hall of Fame, Yahoo’s Blog, in the Examiner, CNN Money, MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. Millions saw Kevin while logging in to LinkedIn.com from 2011-2014.  He is now the Founder, President & CEO of The Social Engineering Project, Inc.  For a full biography and CV, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.
 
Please view some of the TSEP’s previous news coverage here.
 
-END-

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: JUNE 19, 2019
 
CONTACT: KEVIN L. NICHOLS,
Founder, President & CEO
The Social Engineering Project, Inc.
Phone: (415) 490-8010
Email: [email protected]
Website: wwww.TheSocialEngineer.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheSocialEngineerProject
IG/Twitter: @SocialEnginProj
 
 
Underrepresented Students of Color Learn Culturally Relevant STEM Education at Stanford
 
 
Oakland, CA (June 19, 2019) - Summer STEM camps are luxuries for underrepresented students of color (“USOC”).  Many students are either unaware that they exist, are priced out of attending if the camp is at a top tier institution of higher learning, such as Cal or Stanford ($600-$3,000 per week), or do not have adequate means of transportation to get to and from the camp.  For these and other reasons, Dr. Bryan Brown of Stanford’s Graduate School of Education and Kevin L. Nichols of President & CEO of The Social Engineering Project, Inc. created Science In The City ("SITC").
 
SITC is a low cost week long intensive summer camp for incoming 5th and 6th grade USOC from throughout the Bay Area at Stanford University that takes place from June 24th to June 28th. Students are transformed into scientists on Day 1, are given lab coats, and are exposed to 15 culturally relevant chemistry, physics, and science experiments, which is more than some of these students will get during an entire year of traditional schooling.  Students will use tools like Virtual Reality in conjunction with traditional STEM/engineering to learn about the world and how it relates to them from a culturally relevant perspective.  For example, one of our labs focuses on the Flint Water Crisis, where students create water filtration units to segregate out dirty particles of water and learn how to lobby their elected officials to deal with the remaining lead in their cups.  Students learn to use science to protect themselves, their families, and their community.
 
Science in the City is made possible through a collaboration between Stanford University's Science in the City Research Group and The Social Engineering Project, Inc. and receives funding from various tech companies in Silicon Valley, such as Google, Walmart Labs, Airbnb, Microsoft, and the Port of Oakland.  Healthy lunches and transportation are provided.
 
 
SCIENCE IN THE CITY SUMMER CAMP
DATES:                 Monday, June 24th through Friday, June 28th
TIME:                    9:00 am to 3:00 pm
LOCATION:          Stanford University School of Education
 
 
About
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (http://www.TheSocialEngineer.org) is an Oakland-based Google and Microsoft funded social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry through STEM related pipeline programs. 
 
About
The Science in the City research team (http://scienceinthecity.stanford.edu) at Stanford University is comprised of former science teachers who examine how to improve science teaching and learning in urban contexts. The Science in the City website provides a venue for students, teachers, and colleagues to exchange ideas and to hear about new research findings.
 
About
Kevin L. Nichols has worked in multifaceted capacities in some of the most prolific international law firms in the country, such as Morrison & Foerster, Paul Hastings, Heller Ehrman, and Holland & Knight. His interest in diversity and technology began while he was a mechanical engineering/diversity intern at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.  Later, he became the Executive Director of the California Diversity Council and the African American Wellness Project. Kevin has become a social networking expert and full-time consultant specializing in litigation technology (eDiscovery), diversity, and social media marketing for the legal industry.  Nichols has been featured on LinkedIn’s Hall of Fame, Yahoo’s Blog, in the Examiner, CNN Money, MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. Millions saw Kevin while logging in to LinkedIn.com from 2011-2014. He is now the Founder, President & CEO of The Social Engineering Project, Inc.  Kevin attended U.C. Berkeley, an Executive Program for Social Entrepreneurship at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, and is pursuing a Fundraising Academy Certificate at JFK University’s Sanford Institute of Philanthropy. For a full biography and CV, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.
 
About
Bryan A. Brown is an associate professor of science education at Stanford University, a member of Stanford’s Science in the City research team, and a cofounder of The Social Engineering Project. His work in the center for research on teaching at Stanford focuses on improving urban science education. He focuses on exploring how language and identity impact urban students’ learning. Dr. Brown is a former high school science teacher who earned a Bachelor’s degree in Biological Sciences from Hampton University, a Master’s degree in Educational Psychology from the University of California, and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was the 2007 winner of the National Association for Research in Science Education’s (N.A.R.S.T.) award for outstanding early career scholarship. Dr. Brown is the founder and executive director of Etu Schule, a non-profit organization that supports the educational development of minorities throughout the state of California.
 
Please find a video of news coverage from a previous years's camp below. 
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​FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 17, 2018
 
CONTACT: KEVIN L. NICHOLS
Founder, President & CEO
The Social Engineering Project, Inc.
Phone: (415) 490-8010
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.TheSocialEngineer.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheSocialEngineerProject
Instagram: @SocialEnginProj
Twitter: @SocialEnginProj
 2nd Annual TSEP Overnight Camping Conference at Camp Cazadero
 
Oakland, CA (September 17, 2018) – The Social Engineering Project, Inc. (“TSEP”) is an Oakland based Google and Microsoft funded social impact venture with Stanford University that is designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry. One of its programs is the TSEP Camping Conference, an overnight camp for underrepresented high school students of color throughout Northern California.

October 5-7, 2018, TSEP will take approximately over 100 underrepresented 9th-12th grade high school students camping to learn about math, science, engineering, and other STEM related careers during a 3 day overnight conference at Camp Cazadero.  Buses from Santa Clara, Alameda, and Sacramento counties will take the students and 20 counselors from various tech professions to near the Russian River, where they will be free of the typical high school distractions (no signal, no texting or Wi-Fi) and be one with nature.
 
Key Outcomes
a.) Desire to go to college;
b.) Pursue STEM related careers;
c.) Develop a deeper respect for the environment and work/life balance;
d.) Learn how to apply to college, excel on exams, seek financial aid, participate in college life; and 
e.) Learn how to promote their personal brand, how to work in teams, engage in entrepreneurship, and network for future collaboration.

Workshops
In order to expose our students to various career pathways, we needed highly engaging, hands-on- workshops from tech companies to motivate and inspire our students to go to college and major in STEM related majors in order to ultimately work in tech companies.  This year, we have the following workshops and presenters:

1. Blockchain 101 - lead by Blockchain for Social Justice is designed to explain the mechanics behind blockchain technology; 
2. Starting/working at a tech company - lead by NextPlay.ai will show how to leverage tech to solve important world problems;
3. Tech with a side of Customer Success - lead by TriNet will illuminate other careers in tech such as Client Success;
4. SLA and Operations Management - lead by Walmart Labs is designed use math and engineering to problem solve error codes in order to reach a Service Level Agreement.
5.  Explanation of the game developing process and various roles involved - lead by Zynga will teach students prototyping and provide an overview of the gaming industry.
​
TSEP Camping Conference is sponsored by PG&E, Northrop Grumman, Airbnb, and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. We are still fundraising to help students to attend who have applied for hardship scholarships.  If you would like to contribute, please visit our GoFundMe campaign.  

Here is the registration link for the registration page for the camp http://bit.ly/TSEPcc18. The cost per student was $125.  Hardship scholarships are available. For more information, please visit www.TheSocialEngineer.org.
 
TSEP OVERNIGHT CAMPING CONFERENCE
DATES:                 Friday, October 5th at 10am through Sunday, October 7th at 4pm
LOCATION:          Camp Cazadero, Guerneville, CA
 
 
About
The Social Engineering Project, Inc. is an Oakland based, Google and Microsoft funded social impact venture with Stanford University designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry.  TSEP achieves this end through STEM pipeline programs that lead to technical career pathways for underrepresented students of color.  TSEP’s sponsoring 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization is the YMCA of the East Bay.
 
About
Kevin L. Nichols has worked in multifaceted capacities in some of the most prolific international law firms in the country, such as Morrison & Foerster, Paul Hastings, Heller Ehrman, and Hollan d & Knight. His interest in diversity and technology began while he was a mechanical engineering/diversity intern at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.  Later, he became the Executive Director of the California Diversity Council and the African American Wellness Project. Kevin has become a social networking expert and full-time consultant specializing in litigation technology (eDiscovery), diversity, and social media marketing for the legal industry.  Nichols has been featured on LinkedIn’s Hall of Fame, Yahoo’s Blog, in the Examiner, CNN Money, Reuters, MarketWatch and the Wall Street Journal. Millions saw Kevin while logging in to LinkedIn.com from 2011-2014.  He is now the Founder of The Social Engineering Project, Inc., an Oakland based, Google and Microsoft funded, social impact venture with Stanford University designed to address the lack of diversity in the tech industry.  Kevin attended the University of California, Berkeley and recently completed an Executive Program for Social Entrepreneurship at Stanford's Graduate School of Business.  For a full biography and CV, please visit http://bit.ly/KLNport.
 
​Please view some of the TSEP’s previous news coverage here.
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