IEEE Women in Engineering Magazine - June 2008 - 53

Madras WIE
activities often
work to
change social
conventions
that limit
women's
aspirations in
India.

vant topics. There are also technical
school's first national conference. Her
workshops, industrial visits, social getdedication did not go unnoticed and
togethers such as alumni meets, and
earned her the great appreciation of both
even an exclusive library with the latest
the engineering college and the All India
technical publications for the benefit of
Council for Technical Education.
the branch members.
In 2001, Marimuthu joined
Proudly, Marimuthu
the Easwari Engineering
declares that while
College, a part of Anna
Goals
"Member strength has
University, as an assisinclude
never exceeded 100,
tant professor. She
abolishing child
our very enthusiascontinues her work
labor, educating rural tic and active memthere today as an edubers provide a
cator of both underwomen, and
quality
working envigraduate
and
developing selfronment." With a
postgraduate students
sustaining
wonderful team spirit,
in very large scale intevillages.
Easwari IEEE Student
gration (VLSI) and embedMembers take part in project
ded systems. During her
design and essay-writing contests
tenure, she has served as the chief
each year and were the first group to regsuperintendent for Easwari's Examinaister for the recent Region 10 (Asia-Paciftions Committee as well as chair of the
ic) Student Congress, where 20 students
Board of Evaluation for the master's
even helped out as volunteers.
degree program in computer applications.

Building a Student Branch

Local Progress Comes First

In addition to these hefty responsibilities,
Marimuthu decided to take on yet another initiative: that of getting students
involved with the IEEE in India. However, when she attempted to set up
Easwari's own student branch, she
learned that one already existed! Technically, it had been inaugurated in 2000,
but, she clarifies, "There were no activities and no members." Ramalatha decided to revive the branch in 2002,
garnering 48 members and planning two
workshops in that first year. Currently, as
branch counselor, she organizes programs on career guidance, personality
development, motivation, and other rele-

Marimuthu and her
students want to
encourage the beneficial use of technology
in society as a whole,
but as a group in
India, they must first
make bring progress
on a local level. "India
lives in villages," she
says. "So bringing up a
self-sufficient village is
our initial focus. We
are surveying select
villages in different
parts of the state to

get a basic idea of their needs and
wants." This project, named "Sangama"
(Confluence), pairs IEEE student branch
members with workers at the social welfare organization Yuva Shakthi (Passion,
Character, and Courage) to supply the
villages with the resources they may
need to advance. The goals of this mission, as Marimuthu outlines them, are to
"abolish child labor, educate rural
women, and develop the villages into
self-sustaining, economically stable
ones." The branch anticipates introducing more technology into the villages
once the need for it has been established
and, in this way, demonstrate the aims of
the IEEE to rural sections of India.
The IEEE has also provided
Marimuthu with the opportunity to work
to change some of the social conventions
that continue to limit Indian women's
aspirations-the same conventions that
she faced in earlier years. After starting
the Madras branch of IEEE Women in
Engineering in 2006, she has spread WIE
to eight different colleges so far. "We are
working to uplift [the women in our]
society and upgrade their quality of life,"
she states. To that end, her team organizes the Student, Teacher, and Resource
(STAR) program every year and spends
time each semester with inhabitants at a
local home for destitute women. In
recognition of all this hard work, the
Madras branch received an honorable
mention as the 2006 WIE Student
Branch Affinity Group of the Year. And
Marimuthu has been selected as the 2008
WIE coordinator for the entire Region 10.

A WIE
symposium and
inauguration
was held at St.
Xaviers
Catholic
College of
Engineering.

SUMMER 2008

IEEE WOMEN IN ENGINEERING MAGAZINE

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Women in Engineering Magazine - June 2008