She Dropped Out of Her PhD to Get 25 Million Girls Into Tech | Tara Chklovski - CEO, Technovation

In this inspiring and thought-provoking episode of the HumanizeHer Podcast, hosts sit down with Tara Chklovski, CEO and Founder of Technovation (formerly Iridescent). Tara shares her incredible personal trajectory, growing up in India surrounded by formidable female role models - her grandmother who built a school from scratch at age 65 and her mother who joined the Indian military as a doctor at age 43 - and learning hands-on mechanics from her father.

Tara is on a mission to transform the future of technology and innovation to empower girls and young women to use cutting-edge technology to solve real-world problems. Technovation is the world's largest accelerator for young women and now reaches over 34,000 participants from more than 100 countries, supported by thousands of volunteers worldwide. Over three months, Technovation girls partner with mentors from leading tech companies to launch real tech startups, tackling problems they see in their own communities. With nearly half a million lives already impacted and a bold mission to reach 25 million more, Technovation is proving something powerful: when you give a girl the tools, mentorship from industry leaders, and belief that she can change the world - she will. And that changes everything for all of us.

Tara discusses dropping out of a PhD program after seeing her aerospace research used in military drones, pivoting her life to address the gap of women and underrepresented groups in STEM. She details how Technovation grew from a local cafe meetup with 45 girls into the world's largest global tech accelerator for young women, impacting over 450,000 participants across 120 countries. The conversation tackles critical modern challenges, including the seismic impact of AI, bridging the gap between education and the workforce, re-evaluating diversity and inclusion strategies to bring male allies and majority groups along, and the crucial importance of building a "safe sandbox" for new learners.

Episode Highlights:

Unconventional Beginnings: Raised in India where societal norms pushed girls toward home science, Tara was encouraged by her family to work with her hands, fix cars, and pursue physics and aerospace engineering in the U.S.

Birth of Technovation: Spurred by the realization that many young women in the U.S. lacked self-efficacy in math and technology, Tara founded Technovation to give underdogs the tools and mindset to become innovators.

Real-World Global Impact: From California tee