Theresa Brunasso

Theresa Brunasso, President of D&S Microwave, is a 30-year veteran in the field of Electrical Engineering. She currently is a consultant in the Microwave Aerospace and Defense Community. Previously, she spent over 20 years at EMS Technologies, Defense and Space Systems division. At D&SS, Theresa served as Microwave Engineering Manager and Director of Technology Development, but her favorite project was designing the antenna for the Mars Science Lab. Theresa holds an Engineer’s Degree and M.E. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Utah, and a B.S. in Physics from the University of West Florida. She is a member of Sigma Pi Sigma, the National Physics Honor Society. In 2008, she was one of three Georgia area women honored by Women in Technology (WIT) as a winner in the ninth annual Women of the Year in Technology Awards. She is a contributing author to “Climb: Leading Women in Technology Share Their Journeys to Success.”  Theresa loves traveling, and has vacationed in Mexico, Canada, Greece, Italy, France, Spain, Germany, England, Austria, Switzerland, Czech Republic, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Denmark. This summer she will visit Portugal. She lives outside Atlanta with her husband, Brian Boe, a mathematics professor at UGA. You can reach Theresa at  theresa.brunasso AT dsmicrowave DOT com

What is your current job and career field?

I’m founder and president of D&S Microwave.  My company is a minority woman and veteran owned microwave consulting company supporting the Defense and Space industry.

What sorts of jobs did you have leading up to this? aka What is one example of a path to get where you are today.

Prior to starting D&S Microwave, I spent more than 20 years at EMS Technologies, Defense and Space division. At EMS, I served as Microwave Engineering Manager, Director of Technology Development, and worked on numerous programs, including JSTARS, TDRS, XM Radio, DarkStar, NSTAR, Milstar, Advanced EHF, IntelSat and the Mars Science Lab. Prior to joining EMS Technologies, I worked at Georgia Tech Research Institute and Teledyne MEC.  I began my career in the U.S. Navy as an Instructor at the Consolidated Naval Electronic Warfare School in Pensacola, FL.

Everyday is probably different, but what general tasks are you responsible for? What sort of technology do you use?

I’m responsible for everything in my business, including finding clients, performing research, doing design work, finding other contractors to work with me on projects, and writing reports.

What schooling do you need for a job similar to yours?

I have an Engineer’s Degree and M.E. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Utah, and a B.S. in Physics from the University of West Florida.  To do microwave design work, you need a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering or Physics.

In your industry, what are typical entry level jobs and pay?

Engineers’ starting salaries top the list of highest paid bachelor degrees.  For electrical engineers with a B.S. degree, the average starting salary in 2011 was just over $61,000.

What is cool about what you do?  What do you enjoy the most?

I get to design hardware that is used in space for communications and remote sensing.  In fact, I worked on the antennas that will be used to land the Mars Rover Curiosity on Mars later this year.  I also worked on the antennas on the DarkStar UAV that is hanging in the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington DC.

What are common assumptions or mistakes people in regards to your field?

I think the most common mistake people make is that they think engineers spend all their time sitting in front of a computer.  In fact, engineering is very collaborative, and we spend a lot of time talking to our customers and other engineers to come up with the best solution for our customer’s problem.  Also, it surprises me that when people list professions that require creativity, they don’t include engineering.  Designing hardware or software takes a lot of creativity, and that is what makes our jobs so much fun.

Do you have any organizations, websites, or internships you can recommend for ladies who want to learn more or get connected ?

I’m an active member of the Atlanta chapter of IEEE Women in Engineering, and I recommend the following websites:

www.engineeryourlife.org

www.engineergirl.org

www.discoverengineering.org

This is an update to “My Horrible Experience Purchasing SWTOR online from Origins & EA“

I wanted to provide an update both because I said I would and because it turns out there are some great people at EA. By the next morning following my incident, the EA support, Origins, and an individual EA support staffer had reached out to me to try and correct the situation via Twitter.  I started corresponding with the individual EA staffer.  Note to companies who provide support via Twitter: If your customer can’t articulate the problem in 1-2 tweets, give them a real email address to continue correspondence. Nothing makes me more aggravated than being limited to 140 characters for complex issues.  It also leaves me feeling like the support account for that company doesn’t have any authority and is only there as a cosmetic solution for customers and to keep PR happy.

Thankfully, the guy from EA I dealt with gave me an email address.  I was then able to email him all of the screenshots I had put together.  Note to consumers of any kind: If your stuff starts not working, take pictures, screenshots, video, etc to help document your issues.  There is helpful for anyone who will help you fix it.  He responded by thanking me for the detailed information and asked about what system I was trying to run the Origins client on.  This started a correspondence that is still happening right now, but I’m happy to report a few things:

• The guy helping me (Delaney), has had great persistence to involve everyone on his end to figure out why this happened.
• Delaney/EA appears to have a genuine desire to understand why this glitch happened in their system and fix it for future customers.
• Delaney has been nothing but professional and courteous.

I was able to download the game the next day trying to purchase it again.  It worked the second time and I have been enjoying SWTOR since then, but Delaney/EA appreciated the fact that my first experience was horrendous.  He has offered to add any Origin title to my account that EA fully produces (aka, no Valve).  As he pointed out, BioWare has control over monthly SWTOR fee’s, otherwise I think he would offered me a few free months.

I have yet to pick a game since I’m pretty much all about SWTOR, but the gesture was appreciated.  I’ll let you guys know what I pick!

I’m sure there will be two camps of you who read this.  There will be the ones of you who think Valentine’s day is just a bunch of crap because it’s fully fabricated and nothing but corporate, and those of you who don’t care and gleefully want to the excuse to give and receive presents.  For those of you that might fall between, here are my Etsy Something Geeky Something Girly picks for celebrating Love.

#1 Girly

“And then you shot me with an arrow of your true love.” – A very loose quote from one of my favorite movies, A Life Less Ordinary.  What could be more girly and romantic than an arrow that conjures up tiny little chubby cupids in diapers, flying around to shoot arrows at you.  Yeah… totally romantic.

Other options:

• Pink LOVE Pillows – Vintage Style Letters
• A Love Story Vintage Book Pop Up

#2 Girlhack

Words With Friends addict with a cute iPhone case  or a book worm with a pretty journal to take all of your book notes?  This print of L O V E letters is for you!

Other options:

• Silver Love Knot
• Romeo Loves Juliet – A Broken Heart Poem

#3 Geeky

This fabulous dinosaur card might get you a, “Clever girl!”

Other options:

• You are my singularity
• Robot Love!

I’ve seen a rash of my friends get their GMail accounts hacked.  It has been unsettling since I like to think that Google would have some iron clad defense against getting hacked for people who use their accounts with normal caution.  It turns out that Google does have some great extra protection, you just have to activate it.  Like anything worthwhile, it will take a few minutes of your time.

Here is Google’s Official Video on the topic, but I’ve summarized what you should need to know.

Click here to view the embedded video.

1. This is a tedious process, but a very good way to make your account safe.
2. What do I mean by tedious?  You will need to assign a text capable phone to your account, that can receive a verification code, and a new code must be used each time you access your GMail account through a new computer.  The computer can be trusted for 30 days at max.
3. You must also generate a new password for each application that uses or is linked to your GMail account.  For example, I have twitter, an iPhone, iPad, Laptop, and Desktop that I want access to my GMail.  Each one had to have a new password.

I still think this is something you should set aside 10-15 minutes to do for yourself, especially if you like to use the same password for multiple logins!  Gather up all devices and write down all websites you want your GMail account to share access.

Click here to read Google’s 2-Step Verification process.

Good luck and let me know if you have questions!  There is also an additional step for Google Account users, FYI.

A long time ago, in 2009, Casey Pugh, came up with a creative new experiment for the web: let’s all recreate Star Wars A New Hope together.  Recreating Star Wars IV is exactly what the Internet did together, in 15 second chunks.  I had a mini party this past Saturday night for a screening and the four of us waded through the feature length director’s cut.  It’s a complete mix of children to adults, novice to pro abilities, and literal to creative interpretations.  During the first 30 minutes, you love almost every clip.  Beyond the 30 minute mark, the novice ones really start to pull you out of the film in contrast with the 15 second gem clips that leave you wanting an entire movie made in that style.

The official Star Wars UnCut website has a top 50 playlist of the best clips from the film.  I would highly suggest just watching that for a taste. Click here to watch!

Here are a few screen shots of some of my favorites.

Welcome to the second installment of Girlhack STEM jobs.  If you want to submit about your own job or have someone to recommend, please send an email to info@girlhack.com

Whitney, who roller skates in her spare time, is seen here at her local roller rink.

Whitney Clavin

Media Relations Specialist and Science Writer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

 Writing is regularly posted at: www.jpl.nasa.gov and www.nasa.gov

Personal twitter: @whitnutt

What is your current job and career field?

I’m a science writer and media specialist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. My “beat” is astrophysics, which means that I help get the word out about cool research being done at JPL on everything from budding solar systems to voracious black holes. Other media reps in my office cover Mars and other planetary topics — we each take our own slice of the universe! I cover several space missions, including the Spitzer Space Telescope and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE.

What sorts of jobs did you have leading up to this? aka What is one example of a path to get where you are today.

Before my current job, I was a science writer at Rockefeller University in New York, New York. There, I wrote about cells and molecules — really tiny things as opposed to really big things.

Everyday is probably different, but what general tasks are you responsible for? What sort of technology do you use?

I do a lot of coordinating via email and phone calls, and I write stories using Word. We’ll first learn about a new research paper coming out, for example, and then it’s my job to help translate the science and get the story out in a way that’s engaging and easy to understand. This involves writing a news release and captions, as well as overseeing the development of graphics and sometimes videos. But it also means a lot of planning and coordinating with several parties — the scientists, other institutions’ press officers, NASA Headquarters, Web and social media teams, etc. Then, once a story goes out, I help answer reporters’ questions and set up interviews.

What schooling do you need for a job similar to yours?

I have a master’s in science journalism from New York University, New York. And before that, I worked for about five years in various molecular biology research labs. My bachelor’s degree is in Biochemistry. But there are many paths to becoming a science writer, or a media representative. Others in my office have journalism backgrounds, for example, and didn’t develop their science-based interests and careers until coming to JPL.

In your industry, what are typical entry level jobs and pay?

Media representative, or press officer, jobs probably pay between about $50,000 and 90,000 per year.

What is cool about what you do?  What do you enjoy the most?

My favorite part of the job is getting to learn so much science! Sometimes I can’t believe that I’m getting paid to learn about how rockets work, for example. Equally as exciting is the next step after learning the science — figuring out new and fun ways to tell the general public about the research. The research can start out extremely technical, but if I take the time to wrap my head around it, I can usually find a way to explain it in more of a big-picture way. I get to share my excitement with the world.

Whitney and her friend dressed up "80's" for work on Halloween.

What are common assumptions or mistakes people in regards to your field?

Because I work in a public relations office, people sometimes think we put the “spin” on things. But with science, the best way to sell it is simply to explain it in clear, engaging language. It sells itself if you do a good job of translating it.

Do you have any organizations, websites, or internships you can recommend for ladies who want to learn more or get connected ?

If you want to go into science writing, probably the best thing to do is start writing. Other tips are to take journalism classes, try to get your writing published if even on a small website, start a blog, and definitely read! If you don’t have much science experience, then taking classes could be a good way to test the waters. Even if you hated physics as teenager, you might find you like it as an adult, and  taking a class would help you figure out if you really want to spend good chunks of time with science.

There are a handful of journalism master’s programs that focus specifically on science. Examples include programs at NYU, Boston University and UC Santa Cruz.

Living in such a digitized world, it’s always fun to see something tangible come from my work. Sure, I get the odd brochure or newsletter a client had leftover, but the vast majority of what I design is simply emailed here and there and viewed on a screen. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course – it pays the bills – but it can be fun to see work come to life in the real world.

Case in point: Minne-goat-a (and no…that’s not a spelling error).

A few months ago, I went in to work with a client and on found this waiting for me on my desk:

It's a coozie!

A coozie! And not just any coozie – a coozie with a logo I designed for a co-worker a few weeks prior. Her children are heavily involved in 4H and show, amongst other animals, goats. She had asked for my design opinion on a logo she was creating for their “goat group”. I took a quick peek and offered some suggestions on how to make it better – using a vector image for the goat, picking a more whimsical font, etc. – but realizing it would only take me a few minutes to implement these changes myself, offered to just do it up right for her in Illustrator.

Fifteen minutes later we had a logo she – and more importantly, the other discerning members of the goat-group – loved. I knew they would be using it on their new website and possibly on some show materials, but I never thought I’d see the logo on such a fun schwag item! It totally made my day.

Cheers!

It’s often the most random and minute design project that brings the most joy (and beverage insulation!). Cheers to fun design!

For those of you who have been long time followers of Girlhack.com, you know I LOVE to share great finds from Etsy for Something Geeky Something Girly.  Honestly, what is a better way to find unique items and and support independent artists?  Today’s theme: Winter Coats

#1 Girly
Channel your inner Christina Hendricks

I think this coat has a classic simple feel to it and accentuates the feminine curve.  Plus I love this coat in this shade of red!  The Etsy seller has a few more color options.

#2 Girlhack
Think Battlestar Galactica meets shopping on 5th Avenue.

I have been an ABSOLUTE sucker for coats like these for years but have yet to bite the bullet.  The lines of this coat are fantastic and I may just need to finally procure one for my winter jacket collection.

#3 Geeky
A cloak of a coat – Hermione’s winter coat!

It’s not actually called Hermione’s coat, but clearly the wizzarding type would wear this.  I think it’s a good combo of a poncho / cape feel and also that school girl look.  Like I said, a perfect coat for Hermione!

AN UPDATE IS HERE!

For the last couple of months, I’ve been trying to be the responsible MMO gamer and wait to purchase Star Wars The Old Republic MMO.  I initially had an order in for the full deluxe package (the $150 one), from Amazon.  Thinking better on it and knowing I needed to be productive until I got some major things accomplished, I cancelled that order.  SWTOR was going to stay off my computer until after my next move, but I changed my mind yesterday after I had heard enough of “Why aren’t you playing SWTOR yet??.” from friends.

Around 5:30pm local time, I Googled “download SWTOR,” and was directed to the Origins website.  I started the process, connected my EA & Origins accounts, made my purchase, and got this screen.

“Thank you for your order.  Your order is being processed and you will be notified of the result shortly.”

I waited about a minute.  No email.  I waited 5 minutes.  Still no email.  It seemed a little odd since most places will at least send you an almost immediate email confirming your purchase with an order number.  At this point I started exploring the Origin website and downloaded the PC client.

I installed it and sheepishly noticed the Sims 3 was there for download (yup, I just confessed that one).  I thought maybe reloading my games would bring up SWTOR.  No luck.  I clicked to try my first live tech help chat and was only able to enter one sentence before the program was telling me that I was not in chat session. Annoyed by this, I had EA support call me with their call back feature.

At this point, it was around 6:30 pm, an hour later, and the First EA Phone Support guy I talked to tells me that I have a fraud alert on my American Express card and that it wasn’t processing.  This caused some alarm and panic, although I realized I hadn’t gotten the standard email from Amex telling me about the fraud (which, btw, they are GREAT at!).  So, I call American Express and wade through the sea of menus and finally talk to someone.  The polite gentleman informs me he sees the charge and it is pending, but they have NO holds on my account.  I was relieved at no fraud, but very annoyed EA lied to me.

I decided to try the chat client again via the Origins desktop client.  Again, no working client and no working chat.  I tried looking at the Origins “store” part to check order history.  All I got was a gray screen.  After a reboot much later in the night, then I got an error, so almost nothing again.

What I saw most of the night - BLANK SCREEN

What I finally saw after reboot. Almost nothing.

I decided to have EA call me back again.  This time, after I explained my American Express was fine, the friendly guy told me that sometimes EA randomly flags accounts for extra screening and it can take a few more hours for processing, but “You’ll be able to play by the end of the night!”

I took his answer, let the massive 25gb SWTOR file choke my Internet, and went on to cooking dinner and enjoying my evening.

11:15pm, I realized NO email had come through and my download was done.  I went back on to the Origins client to try and refresh my games to get SWTOR to appear.  No luck.  I decided to attempt a reboot which accomplished two things.  The first being I now got a server error on the store part of the client (see above) and the second that the chat with support function was now working.

Wading through poor English, the chat tech support guy finally told me my order had been cancelled and that something had probably gone wrong in processing.  No explanation for why it was cancelled or by whom and no explanation for no email EVER about this.  The end solution was for me to repurchase the game without understanding why it happened.  You can read the transcript below.

At this point I was tweeting out about the whole incidence.  @SWTOR was still up and active and responded with a thread to their forums with similar issues.  I tried using the link to look up my purchase number.  What came up?  The Capcom Store with an out of stock cancelled order from last July to buy a friend a Mega Man 2 shirt.  Oy.

I am now dealing with a customer service agent this morning and have sent half a dozen emails back and forth.  He is being nice and most likely the technical issues are out of his hands but the remaining questions for me are as follows:

1) Why did I NEVER GET ANY EMAIL notification?

2) Why do they not give you a purchase # on the screen after you buy? (Look above)

3) Why was I given three different reasons to as to why my order would not complete?

4) Why did my order get cancelled and again, why did I not get an email about it?

5) What is EA/Origins willing to do to help smooth this out?

I will update once my email correspondence is finished.

So, I repurchased the game and actually DID get a confirmation email about 2 hours later.  The game is now ready to play.  Let’s hope that goes smoothly!

**FWIW – I am running Origins on Bootcamp with Windows 7 on my MacBookPro

Would you send videos or messages to friends and family after you die? How would you do it?  All morbidness aside, the “if i die” Facebook app aims to help you with making that wish possible.  Should you die, you must have at least three of your trustees (friends you ask) verify that you’ve died.  Once they have done this, your messages will be released in the order and dates that you have defined.  For example, you could have a message go out every year on your Birthday.

I signed up for the service and asked a few friends to be trustees, but every time I think about composing a “from the grave message”, it ends up just seeming so silly.  Why?  Probably because I don’t anticipate dieing anytime soon.  I’ll probably get on this sort of thing whenever I actually make a will and who knows when that will be.  I can see this service being useful for terminally ill friends and family.  I think that that when people feel like their life is being taken from them, they are happy when they get to have power over something.  The if i die app seems like it can help fulfill that need.

Will you use it and sign up?

Check out the app here!

Click here to view the embedded video.