Spring Into #AlumniApril!
Happy #AlumniApril! The sky’s the limit for our Girls Who Code students and community. That’s why all month long we want to celebrate you — our incredible alumni and community. For a little STEM vision board inspo, check out what our Alumni Advisory Council members are up to:
Lauren Cho is a third-year student at UCLA. She has been a proud member of Girls Who Code for nine years. During this time, she served as the Los Angeles Chapter founder and three-year president, Palos Verdes Chapter five-year member, and Meta-GWC Cohort member.
Devika Chipalkatti is currently a front-end software engineer at Disney living in LA. As a 2016 Summer Immersion Program Graduate, Girls Who Code inspired her to create her own club at her high school. From there, Devika acted as a SIP Teaching Assistant in 2019 and spoke on behalf of Girls Who Code in interviews for WIRED and USA Today. In her free time, she enjoys running, reading tarot cards, and making her own homemade cold brew to pay homage to her hometown, Seattle.
Emely Chavez is studying computer science at Western Governors University. She currently serves as a STEM instructor and mentor at the Boys and Girls Club of Harlem, where Emely teaches artificial intelligence fundamentals, media literacy, and app development.
Emely finds joy in advocating for education and sustainability and expressing herself through various hobbies — dancing to K-pop tunes showcased on her Instagram, to engaging in boxing and yoga. Emely’s diverse interests also include the art of clay, evolving into a passion for crafting clay jewelry.
Grace Magny-Fokam is a junior studying Computer Science at the University of Maryland, College Park. She’s also an AI researcher and a United Nations climate technology consultant, who’s dedicated to intersections of technology and social justice.
In high school, she discovered a passion for social and climate advocacy after attending a UN summit. Since then, she’s partnered with organizations such as Google, Microsoft, the U.S. Department of Defense, the National Science Foundation, and NASA to research technologies that emphasize social impact. In her free time, Grace loves reading historical fiction books and cooking.
Anika Washburn received her B.S. in Computer Science from Case Western Reserve University in 2022 and is currently working as a Software Engineer at Microsoft. Inspired by her passion for changing the face of tech, she founded a coding club in high school and later joined a Girls Who Code College Loop..
Anika joined the Girls Who Code CWRU Chapter during her freshman year as a volunteer and progressed into the co-president role for her final two years. Outside of her professional endeavors, Anika enjoys many outdoor activities including playing soccer and pickleball, biking, mountaineering, and skiing.
Katelyn Villacres is a senior in the CUNY Macaulay Honors program at Queens She interned with Boss Beauties where she helped develop an app prototype that taught financial literacy to Gen-Z women. She also participated in Google’s Computer Science Summer Institute, and became one of their teaching assistants the following year. Some of Kate’s hobbies include skateboarding, singing, acting, playing sports, and coding. She also recently returned from studying abroad in Italy.
Want to learn more about women in STEM? Follow us on social media and subscribe to our newsletter as we highlight more council members for #AlumniApril.
