News

NATICK, Mass. – Several leaders and employees from the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Soldier Center, or DEVCOM SC, recently attended a prestigious three-day event hosted by the Society of Women Engineers.

Society of Women Engineers 2023, or SWE23, strove to empower women by providing attendees opportunities to network, garner career insights, and participate in interactive workshops. The event provided a supportive and inspiring environment intended to foster innovation.

Jaclyn Fontecchio, deputy director of DEVCOM SC, believes the event was an important opportunity for the Soldier Center to connect with innovators and talent within the field.

“This was a fantastic opportunity for Soldier Center to connect with women scientists and engineers,” said Fontecchio. “Overall, females are still underrepresented in the Soldier Center technical workforce and this event gave our organization exposure to that demographic. We collected several resumes from women who are excited at the prospect of working for the Army and specifically for the Soldier Center mission.”

In addition to Fontecchio, the event was also attended by DEVCOM SC’s Zoe Rosenberg, Ph.D., Caroline Mahoney, Ph.D., Elizabeth Barrett, Debarati Dasgupta, Sophia Caffery, and Virginia Rettie.

Rettie — a program analyst in DEVCOM SC’s G-1 Human Resources Office and the lead for the Student Employment and Recent Graduate Program — viewed the event as an opportunity to attract diverse talent to the Soldier Center’s workforce.

“The Soldier Center continued our efforts to increase diversity among our workforce by engaging and recruiting talented women engineers from SWE23,” said Rettie.

Rettie explained that representatives from DEVCOM SC spoke with college students, recent graduates, senior scientists, and engineers from across the country about the Soldier Center’s mission, as well as career opportunities.

“Many participants from all backgrounds were eager to align their technical skills to current and future positions at DEVCOM SC in Natick and Orlando, expressing interest in R&D work to support the warfighter,” said Rettie.

DEVCOM SC is a longtime leader in researching and developing Soldier clothing and equipment. As the role of female Soldiers continues to expand, DEVCOM SC is working to develop clothing and equipment that specifically meets the needs of female Soldiers.

Fontecchio, who oversees innovative science and technology solutions for Soldier optimization at DEVCOM SC, was chosen to be one of the speakers at the event. SWE chooses speakers who are regarded as thought leaders in their chosen fields.

Fontecchio spoke on “A New Frontier of Emerging Technologies: A Panel Discussion on DoD Innovations,” along with co-presenters Jeremy Lanman, Ph. D., chief technology officer at U.S. Army Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation, or PEO STRI; Carmela Rice, chief of Software Integration at DEVCOM Aviation and Missile Center, or DEVCOM AvMC; and Karen Saunders, the program executive officer at PEO STRI.

“The women in the crowd had some great questions for me about what we do to develop female-specific clothing and equipment for our warfighters,” said Fontecchio.

The deputy director found the opportunity to interact with professionals from around the globe invaluable. She also enjoyed the opportunity to interact and bond with Soldier Center colleagues.

“The best part of the trip, for me, was getting to know the Soldier Center women that were part of our group,” said Fontecchio. “The Soldier Center has such a fantastically brilliant workforce with such diverse technical backgrounds, and it’s always wonderful to get to know individuals better. We built a great small network of colleagues during the week.”

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About DEVCOM Soldier Center: The DEVCOM Soldier Center is committed to discovering, developing, and advancing science and technology solutions that ensure America’s warfighters are optimized, protected, and lethal. DEVCOM Soldier Center supports all of the Army’s Modernization efforts, with the Soldier Lethality and Synthetic Training Environment Cross Functional Teams being the DEVCOM Soldier Center’s chief areas of focus. The center’s science and engineering expertise are combined with collaborations with industry, DOD, and academia to advance Soldier and squad performance. The center supports the Army as it transforms from being adaptive to driving innovation to support a Multi-Domain Operations Capable Force of 2028 and a MDO Ready Force of 2035. DEVCOM Soldier Center is constantly working to strengthen Soldiers’ performance to increase readiness and support for warfighters who are organized, trained, and equipped for prompt and sustainable ground combat.

STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) outreach and mentoring the next generation of scientists and engineers are also an important part of the mission of DEVCOM Soldier Center. The mentoring of students by Army scientists and engineers benefits the students and their communities. It also increases young people’s awareness of potential Army job opportunities and helps provide the Army with potential new talent, helping to fuel innovative ideas that benefit the nation’s warfighters and the nation as a whole.

DEVCOM Soldier Center is part of DEVCOM. Through collaboration across the command’s core technical competencies, DEVCOM leads in the discovery, development and delivery of the technology-based capabilities required to make Soldiers more lethal to win our nation’s wars and come home safely. DEVCOM is a major subordinate command of the U.S. Army Futures CommandCenter.

By Jane Benson, DEVCOM Soldier Center Public Affairs