Some Hillsborough County middle school girls are getting hands on experience in the STEM field this summer at a special camp.  

It’s hosted by Mission: Tampa Bay and Hillsborough County Schools and focuses on science, technology, engineering and math, with the goal of eventually getting more women working in those fields.

Dr. Tracy Fanara gets the girls geared up before heading out on the water to kayak in an estuary in Apollo Beach, taking water and soil samples.

“They’re looking at salinity, they’re looking at other chemical components, they’re taking their samples for biology and they’re also supposed to be looking at the physics and engineering component of this stream system,” she said.

Fanara is an environmental engineer and ocean scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAH. At this moment, though, she’s sharing her knowledge with a group of middle school girls.

“It makes me really jealous, because this is not the stuff I had growing up," Fanara said. "I didn’t even know what an environmental engineer was."

But after this camp, she says the girls will know how to take, and test, water samples, how to properly document their scientific observations, and they’ll know all about this water system.

Ari Whitcomb is going into seventh grade next year and is working as the “project manager” for her team at camp. She said she’s excited for everything Tracy is teaching them.  

“We’re going to be sampling water trying to find out how deep it is, how fast the waters moving, the salinity level and all that,” she said.

And organizers say that’s the whole idea behind the camp — getting girls excited about STEM, and teaching them about careers historically geared towards men, something Fanara said she wishes she had when she was their age.

“Having these girls out here understand that they can be anything they want, there’s no stereotype to smart, or science, and the big thing is that no matter what career path they choose," she said. "I want them to have an understanding and appreciation of our environment.”