‘Roadtrip Nation’ Announces the Premiere of ‘A Balanced Equation,’ a New Series Highlighting Women in STEM

Roadtrip Nation, renowned for its New York Times best-selling career guide and award-winning documentary television series, announced today that a new documentary, “Roadtrip Nation Presents: A Balanced Equation,” will air on American Public Television stations nationally starting on September 1. Made possible by the support of AT&T, through its AT&T Aspire initiative, and distributed through KQED, “A Balanced Equation”—the fourteenth season of “Roadtrip Nation”—follows three young women on a cross-country journey as they meet and interview women who have built fulfilling careers in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).

Women make up 48 percent of the workforce, but only 23 percent of women hold jobs in STEM. “A Balanced Equation” seeks to challenge this inequality by highlighting stories of women leaving their unique marks on the STEM fields, empowering females everywhere to discover the exciting realms of innovation that are improving lives, solving problems, and making a positive impact on our future.

“Sharing stories and experiencing firsthand what career options are available are pillars of Roadtrip Nation’s mission. This series illustrates real stories of trailblazing women who charted their own paths in STEM careers and continue to challenge the imbalance in the STEM sectors, further revealing the many opportunities available in these evolving industries,” said Mike Marriner, co-founder of Roadtrip Nation.

“A Balanced Equation showcases the vast opportunities in STEM, and the impact that female STEM professionals are having in all areas of our society,” said Nicole Anderson, assistant vice president, social innovation, AT&T services. “We hope this series will inspire young women to pursue their own career path in one of these fields, and help close the gap of women representation in the STEM workforce.”

The road-trippers featured in the series have diverse backgrounds, but all share interests in STEM: 

• Ariel Noble from North Little Rock, AK: Ariel has known she wanted to enter the medical field ever since she volunteered at a medical center at the age of 12. She’s currently working on her master’s degree in biomedical research, and now she wants to inspire other women and underrepresented groups to pursue careers in STEM, too.
• Elicia Dennis from Denver, CO: As a kid, if something plugged into a wall, Elicia was taking it apart to find out how it worked. That curiosity drove her toward other challenges—from majoring in electrical engineering, to taking this road trip. She wants to gain as many new experiences as she can, each one with a new lesson that will better prepare her to push the culture around STEM forward.
• Regina Lim from New York City, NY: The thing that Regina loves about computer science is its openness. There are many ways to reach the same endpoint—and the solution is never final. But she’s not sure if programming is what she wants to do for the rest of her life, so she wants to seek out other women’s paths to careers in STEM and learn about the twists and turns that led them to write, and then rewrite their stories.

Over the course of four episodes, “A Balanced Equation” follows these three road-trippers from Boston to San Francisco, with highlighted stops in New York, Atlanta, and Dallas along the way. Through interviews with professionals from Partpic founder and CEO Jewel Burks, to artist and climate change activist Zaria Forman, the journey introduces the road-trippers—and audiences—to women who overcame obstacles and discovered all types of opportunities in STEM. As Debbie Sterling, engineer and founder of GoldieBlox, tells the road-trippers, "All it took was one piece of advice from a woman that I respected to put me on a path that changed the rest of my life." This series hopes to have that same effect on young women all across America.

AT&T has supported Roadtrip Nation’s mission since 2012. The company’s support is part of AT&T Aspire, its initiative that helps provide the education and skills training people need to succeed.

To watch “A Balanced Equation” or to find local broadcast airtimes, visit: roadtripnation.com/roadtrip/women-in-stem

To learn more about the project on social media channels, follow @RoadtripNation, @ConnectToGood, #ATTimpact and #ABalancedEquation on Twitter.

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About Roadtrip Nation 
Through its documentary television series and acclaimed classroom curriculum, Roadtrip Nation is a career exploration organization that creates content, products, and experiences to help individuals pursue fulfilling careers. Combining self-reflection with real-world exposure, Roadtrip Nation’s tools enable youth to connect their interests to relevant life pathways and stay engaged with their futures. For more information, visit roadtripnation.com and roadtripnation.org.About Philanthropy & Social Innovation at AT&T 
AT&T is committed to advancing education, strengthening communities and improving lives. Through its community initiatives, AT&T has a long history of investing in projects that create learning opportunities; promote academic and economic achievement; or address community needs. The company’s signature philanthropic initiative, AT&T Aspire, drives innovation in education to promote student success in school and beyond. With a financial commitment of $400 million since 2008, AT&T is leveraging technology, relationships and social innovation to help all students make their biggest dreams a reality.

About KQED Public Television 
KQED Public Television, the PBS affiliate that serves Northern California, is one of the country’s most popular public television stations. It brings the values of public media to homes around the Bay Area with Emmy Award–winning programming that inspires, informs and entertains, including Masterpiece Classic: Downton Abbey, Masterpiece Mystery: Sherlock, American Experience, American Masters, Great Performances, POV, Independent Lens, NOVA and Nature. KQED produces local series like Check, Please! Bay Area, KQED NEWSROOM, San Francisco Opera, Truly CA and ImageMakers, as well as popular programs for national broadcast such as Film School Shorts, Essential Pépin and QUEST. KQED also distributes programming to public media stations across the country including The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot About That!, Roadtrip Nation and Joanne Weir’s Gets Fresh. For more information, please visit kqed.org/tv.

About American Public Television 
American Public Television (APT) has been a leading distributor of high-quality, top-rated programming to America’s public television stations since 1961. Since 2004, APT has distributed approximately half of the top 100 highest-rated public television titles. Among its 300 new program titles per year are prominent documentaries, news and current affairs programs, dramatic series, how-to programs, children’s series and classic movies, including For Love of Liberty: The Story of America’s Black Patriots, A Ripple of Hope, Rick Steves' Europe, Newsline, Globe Trekker, Simply Ming, Joseph Rosendo's Travelscope, America's Test Kitchen From Cook’s Illustrated, Lidia's Italy, P. Allen Smith's Garden Home, Midsomer Murders, Moyers & Company, Doc Martin, Rosemary & Thyme, BBC World News, The Rat Pack: Live and Swingin’, Johnny Mathis: Wonderful, Wonderful! and John Denver: The Wildlife Concert. APT also licenses programs internationally through its APT Worldwide service. In 2006, APT launched and nationally distributed Create® – the TV channel featuring the best of public television's lifestyle programming. APT is also a partner in the WORLD™ channel expansion project including its web presence at WORLDchannel.org. For more information about APT’s programs and services, visit APTonline.org. For more information on Create, visit CreateTV.com.