Imagining Possibilities with Girl Scouts of Nassau County

On November 4, Girl Scouts of Nassau County, New York, and Hofstra University hosted their 8^th Annual STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) Conference for Girl Scout Juniors, Cadettes, and other young girls in grades 4-8. The Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) proudly participated in this event, where Lisa Napolione, Senior Vice President, Global Research & Development (R&D) gave a keynote speech and several of ELC’s R&D formulators led a hands-on lip gloss making workshop.

This annual event is an opportunity for girls in the Long Island, New York community to meet and interact with STEM professionals across industries. Throughout the day, over 70 young attendees participated in workshops led by women working across STEM fields, including medicine, engineering, and forensic science. Hosted at Hofstra University, the conference was held about 15 miles away from ELC’s skin care, makeup, body, fragrance, basic science, and advanced technologies R&D labs in Melville, New York.

To cap off the exciting conference, ELC’s Lisa Napolione was invited to give the keynote speech about her own career as a woman in STEM. In her remarks, she explained that her time spent learning in her high school’s chemistry lab and her interest in understanding the biology of skin in college shaped her journey to becoming a scientist. Lisa also shared more about ELC as a best place to work for female scientists, telling them about the breadth and diversity of expertise ELC scientists have – biology, chemistry, behavioral sciences, engineering, physical and material sciences, chemical sciences, medical sciences, math, and more – and explaining the limitless possibilities that exist in beauty and beyond when students study a STEM subject.

Following the keynote, Girl Scouts were invited to a workshop where they each had the opportunity to create their own lip glosses. Simona Sitarus, Director, R&D Product Formulation – Makeup, led the hands-on, interactive experiment and kicked off the workshop by explaining the importance of safety as the girls put on their lab coats, goggles, and gloves. As Simona shared step-by-step directions, Girl Scouts began making their lip glosses, from mixing the ingredients to adding the final formulation into a lip gloss tube. Lisa and two R&D Product Formulation scientists, Kristi Dzurilla and Ashley Silak, joined the workshop to give one-on-one support to each of the girls, ensuring all steps were followed to create the perfect lip gloss. As a special gift for the Girl Scouts, each attendee received a Girl Scouts “Beauty” patch to commemorate the completion of their lip gloss workshop.

With over 70% of our scientists, engineers and technical professionals being women and all of our R&D Innovation Centers being led by women, we’re proof of the power of women to lead in STEM and innovation. By participating in events like the Girl Scouts of Nassau County STEM Conference, we’re able to do our part in showing girls around the world the possibilities that exist in science and that they too have the power to lead in STEM.