Page 12 - BEQ Magazine Vol 4, Iss 4 (01032020 Final)_Active

him value himself in a different way. lectual curiosity and understanding CREATING OSTEM
Patridge’s graduate studies in in others along the way. In 2005, Patridge and fellow
chemistry and molecular and cellular As Patridge was getting more students were sponsored by IBM
biology at Pennsylvania State Univer- involved in LGBTQ community to participate in a focus group
sity also required data savvy, techno- activities, he formed some opin- exploring the advancement of
logical literacy and engineering. His ions based on his observation of his LGBTQ+ students in STEM pro-
ability to cross disciplinary bound- community’s perspective on learn- fessions as part of the first Out for
aries was heightened by his curiosity ing and intellectualism that were Work conference in Washington,
about some Resource Description particularly bothersome to him. DC. During the event, participants
Framework (RDF) graphs of chem- While he was envisioning progress identified the need for an inclusive
ical structures stored in databases and advancement for the commu- organization for technical students
structured much like ontological hier- nity into new shared outcomes and in the LGBTQ+ communities.
archies. Because he was already quite better shared futures, he realized This prompted Patridge to found
familiar with relational databases and that those who had a stake in those oSTEM (Out in Science, Technol-
ETL (extraction transformation and outcomes and futures weren’t nec- ogy, Engineering and Mathemat-
loading of data) for clinical data, the essarily prepared for or interested ics); there had not been one prior
idea of applying ontology to clinical in the journey. Paradoxically, many focused on serving students.
data seemed to be a natural progres- communities are often cold to a new By 2010, Patridge was at the
sion. Where others focused on specif- way or different possibilities and Yale School of Medicine and oS-
ic “worlds”, and even as he focused shun the intellectual rigor and ide- TEM achieved 501(c)(3) status as
on a few of his own, he saw a universe alism that brings new facts to light. a national nonprofit association for
of worlds yet to be explored. Once when he was speaking to a LGBTQ+ students in the STEM
He soon jumped into another group of 50 LGBT students about fields. Patridge served as its Presi-
opportunity, this time building an STEM, he watched one student dent until 2017.
ontology for food nutrition for a yawn conspicuously, stretching out Patridge is a self-proclaimed
business case. He started the effort, his arms expressively to show that mosaic, “a mosaic of different as-
“without really even knowing what he wanted to be somewhere else. pects of things… in some ways I’m
I was doing. So, it was really sort of Somewhere more fun. There was unique particularly to my interest in
an ongoing relationship with the un- something in the culture — his merging disciplines and the blend-
derstanding of what ontology was,” community’s culture — that in his ing of things because that’s hard to
he said. He and his team were able view shunned the hard work (and by do,” he said.
to build a robust ontology that could extension the increased likelihood As he said that, he reminded me
be used in many different ways. of success) of pursuing goals and of an article regarding new skills for
From there he made the move to dreams for the future, even though STEM students. In short, the article
ReactiveCore where he uses ontol- they had the capacity and ability to suggests that engineers of the future
ogies in a very different way. There move the needle forward. It seemed will have to be different, educated
he uses both systems centric ontol- that more times than not when in a different way—more commu-
ogies as well as domain canonical faced with a choice, many peo- nication skills, the ability to work
ontologies to understand, use and ple chose “to socialize, party or be in teams, global knowledge, and an
manipulate ontologies for business otherwise fashionable” rather than entrepreneurial outlook as much
application, specifically in the world reach for a better future. as they will need technical depth.
of big data and cloud computing. “Some of what I want to do with They need to be life-long learners
As Patridge sought to close gaps my life is to help offer more avenues and have more liberal arts exposure.
in understanding, using and ma- and safe spaces to increase the sta-
nipulating big data in the chem- tistical likelihood of people being REALITIES
ical landscape, his inner Trekkie able to achieve [their] intellectual What had been raw talent, nat-
explored the unfolding universe. passion, compassion and success,” ural curiosity and creative expres-
Ontologies can work everywhere! Patridge said. “We’re going to see a sion through the arts and writing
And ontology as philosophy and as lot of things change in our world. I evolved over time. While academi-
an applied science would help foster think, until we have more avenues cally Patridge had been focused on
his own intellectual understanding to compassionate intellectual real- science, engineering and ontology,
within and across the worlds in that ism that work, we will continuously most of which would be obsolete
universe, hopefully spurring intel- be drawn back[ward].” or have evolved upon graduation, it

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