Did you know Women's History Month began in 1978 as "Women's History day" in Sonoma, California? Later, the local event was championed by the National Women's History Alliance nationwide and gained recognition as a national week in 1980. According to the National Women's History Museum, since 1995, U.S. presidents have issued annual proclamations designating the month of March as Women’s History Month.

Throughout this month, Women of Color magazine will showcase our science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) award winners whose stories inspire us daily.

At the 1999 Women of Color STEM Conference, Chon-Yin Tsai, a space and strategic missiles engineer was honored with the Technologist of the Year Award. Other honorees of this prestigious award include retired U.S. Navy rear admiral Eleanor V. Valentin and Asha Goyal.

During her career, Tsai was an engineering fellow in Lockheed Martin Space System's Design Engineering Department and an expert in fluid dynamics and applied computational fluid dynamics.

Her pioneering work in developing computational fluid dynamics techniques for fleet ballistic missile underwater launches contributed to the fundamental understanding and solution of hydrodynamics. In addition, Tsai authored publications and reports covering applied research, computer code development, and problem investigation.

Her awards and honors include the 1997 Women of Achievement Award in the category of Engineering & Technology for Silicon Valley and the 1990 Engineer of the Year Award in the category of Information Systems by the San Francisco Section of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Much later in her career, she was named Asian American Engineer of the Year.

She earned a Ph.D. in aeronautics and astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) while receiving the Amelia Earhart Fellowship three times. Prior, Tsai received a master's degree in applied mathematics from Brown University and a bachelor's degree in applied mathematics from National Chung-Hsing University.

Eleanor V. Valentin is the 2010 Women of Color Technologist of the Year. In 2009, she became the 16th director of the Medical Service Corps, making her the first female Medical Service Corps officer to obtain flag officer rank and the first female to serve as Navy Medical Service Corps director. In addition, she was the second Filipino-American woman to achieve the level of Rear Admiral.

After earning bachelor's degrees in zoology and psychology at the University of Washington, she completed a master’s in public health (health policy and planning) and a second master's in public health (biostatistics) at the University of Hawaii.

In 1982, she was commissioned as a lieutenant junior grade Medical Service Corps, U.S. Navy, and for the next decade, she served in a variety of department head and administrative officer positions at Naval Hospital San Diego; Admiral J.T. Boone Branch Medical Clinic in Norfolk, Va.; Naval Medical Clinic Norfolk; U.S. Naval Hospital Guam; Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington, D.C.; and U.S. Naval Hospital Yokosuka, Japan.

Valentin served as director for administration at Naval Medical Clinic in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, from 1994 to 1997. Following that duty, she became the branch head of TRICARE Marketing and Communications. In October 2000, Valentin was appointed regional operations director in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (Health Affairs) TRICARE Management Activity. There, she led staff and joint service teams in developing plans and strategies to implement statutory and policy guidance for delivering healthcare services to eligible beneficiaries.

Her subsequent assignments included commanding officer at Naval Hospital/Health Clinic Cherry Point, North Carolina; and Navy Medicine National Capital Area chief of staff. From September 2009 to July 2012, she served in her first flag tour as commander of the Navy Medicine Support Command, and from October 2009 through August 2012, she was the first female and 16th director of the Medical Service Corps.

She retired in 2014 as the director of the Military Health System (MHS) Governance Implementation Planning Executive Secretariat, a team that supports plans to establish a new governance model for the MHS. Valentin achieved fellow status in the American College of Healthcare Executives and the Academy of Healthcare Management.

Asha Goyal's story of triumph over adversity was first published in the conference issue of Women of Color magazine. She is the 2004 Technologist of the Year.

Attacked by polio at age two, young Asha refused to be held back. After graduating from high school, she enrolled at the Indian Institute of Technology, where she became the highest-scoring female student on the engineering entrance examination.

Getting around campus had its share of problems, but she persevered, finishing with a Best Student Gold Medal and a bachelor's degree in electronics.

That can-do attitude manifested in graduate school at the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur, where she pursued a master's degree in electrical engineering and a Ph.D. in computer science.

Faced with the need to learn to swim, she mastered three strokes in 15 days, becoming skilled at diving too. Goyal was so good that she became an instructor, teaching others her techniques.

However, campus mobility still presented challenges for Goyal. Undaunted, she developed her wheeled transport, trying out a bicycle, rickshaws, and contraptions made out of hospital equipment before finally settling on a moped she called Luna.

With an extra wheel for mobility, Goyal raced around campus and dragged it to her destination if engine trouble shut it down en route. Two mechanics on call for emergencies fashioned a spark plug cleaner and an adapter that let her use campus compressors to inflate the tires.

Much later, she fell in love with cars in the United States. Unable to take an American vehicle to England on assignment, she got an older transmission from a Morris Mini and shipped it to India.

Corporate assignments took Goyal to many countries, and she vacationed in several others. Eighteen, all told. She's been up the Swiss Alps by cable car and ridden the rides at Disneyland.

At Tata Consultancy, she served as a consultant from 1971 to 1994. She quickly established herself as a leader and innovator in software development. Among other projects, she led an initiative to design a counterpart to the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations' criminal information center. It was the first of its kind in India.

In 1994 she moved to Fujitsu. Over two and a half years, she set up a development facility at Software Technology Park in Noida. She also led the healthcare line of the business and engineered a legacy of healthcare information systems to run with a graphical user interface.

From April 1994 to Oct. 1996, she led the team that serviced healthcare clients in the U.K., New Zealand, and Australia. Later, Goyal joined HCL Perot Systems as executive vice president for software development, continuing her drive to create the best possible software for clients.

In 1999, she moved to IBM and became active with the Institute of Informatics and Communication, Delhi University, as a Fellow of the Institute of Electronics and Telecom Engineers. Goyal retired as vice president of quality from IBM Global Services India in 2006.

Months after signing on to lead the quality team at IBM's Global Services, Goyal propelled her division to become the first unit to achieve recognition as a Software Engineering Institute Capability Maturity Model Level 5 organization.

The institute developed the metric to assess the performance of organizations developing complex commercial software. The fifth level of the Capability Maturity Model is the highest rating.

Goyal's team also won a Level 5 rating under the People Capability Maturity Model. Then, continuing the winning trend, it pushed onto a Level 5 rating under the more involved Capability Maturity Model integrated standard. Goyal, a Six Sigma Blackbelt in quality control, also led the team to reach that standard. Before retiring, Goyal served as vice president for quality at a software company, leading its banking products internationally.