Banks recognizes that her audience is unlikely to assume she is interested in video games, blogging, and building and repairing computers.
But why should that be?
Lots of African Americans have shared Banks's passion for technology. The truth is, African Americans have contributed to the advancement of American science and medicine from the start.
For instance, Benjamin Banneker was an African American mathematician and astronomer who helped map the District of Columbia and who published an almanac in the 1790s. He famously corresponded with Thomas Jefferson, urging him to help "eradicate that train of absurd and false ideas and opinions, which so generally prevails with respect" to people of African descent.
George Washington Carver was born a slave in Missouri and yet went on to become one of the nation's most respected scientific experts on agricultural questions. In 1943, he became the first African American for whom a national monument was erected.
Ruth Howard was born in Washington, D.C. in 1900. She earned a B.A. in social work from Simmons College in Boston and went on to become the first African American woman to earn a Ph.D. in psychology, which she received from the University of Minnesota. She promoted the rights of women and children and argued for greater cultural competency among social workers.
Slavery, segregation, and the Civil Rights Movement are integral components of American history curricula. Yet, there are other dimensions to African American history. In addition to teaching our students about the injustices that African Americans have confronted and the ways in which they have resisted those injustices, we ought to highlight the contributions of African Americans to science and medicine. Awareness of this history undermines harmful stereotypes, provides students of all races with a more diverse spectrum of role models, and draws our attention to common human interests that transcend race.
Some sources:
Benjamin Banneker's letter to Jefferson: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part2/2h71t.html
Benjamin Banneker's biography: http://www.biography.com/people/benjamin-banneker-9198038#early-years
George Washington Carver's biography: http://www.biography.com/people/george-washington-carver-9240299
An APA article about Ruth Howard: http://www.apa.org/pi/oema/resources/ethnicity-health/psychologists/ruth-howard.aspx
A story from Business Insider about Keila Banks's talk: http://www.businessinsider.com/13-year-old-girl-coder-wows-crowd-2015-7
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