her parents. They emigrated from India to the U.S. in 1965. Her mother worked as an accountant after becoming one of the first women to earn an MBA in India, Bhatia says. Her father was an engineer and entrepreneur. In past interviews, Bhatia talked about how her father encouraged her interest in engineering, including taking her as a teenager to visit an MIT lab that was using ultrasound technology to try to destroy tumor cells—an experience that helped pique her interest in developing devices to improve human health.
Bhatia and her husband, systems biologist Jagesh Shah, have nurtured an early interest in science and engineering in their two daughters—13-year-old Anjali and 9-year-old Karina. Shah works on Arduino circuit board projects with the girls, for example. “He’s a geek dad,” Bhatia adds. “I think he would describe himself that way.”
The girls also participate in “Keys to Empowering Youth,” or KEYs, an outreach program that brings middle school-aged girls to MIT’s campus to do hands-on activities in science and engineering. The children get to interact with MIT women students and experiment with lasers, microscopes, and other high-tech tools, Bhatia says. She helped start that program in 1993. It’s now run by the MIT Society of Women Engineers, and similar programs are now held in other parts of the country, Bhatia says.
She says her daughters enjoy science and engineering activities, but they also like art and playing soccer. “They’re kids. They’re curious. … They do lots of things.”
Bhatia doesn’t know whether her daughters will follow in the footsteps of their parents. She’s just glad that science, engineering, and entrepreneurship are “on their radar.”
“I think they definitely don’t have presumptions about science or engineering not being options for them,” Bhatia says. “I think the conversation they’re having for themselves—which is the right one—is, ‘Is this something that I would want to do, as compared to all the other things?’ That’s exactly what you want.”
“If they don’t choose it for the right reasons, that’s fine,” she continues. “Because not everybody’s meant to do this.”
