One of my guilty pleasure TV shows is Eureka on SciFi. The premise is that there is a secret town in the Pacific Northwest where pretty much everyone is a genius and works as a scientist for Global Dynamics. The sheriff is a "normal" non-genius who arrived in town with his teen-aged daughter by accident. It's played for humor, and several of the main characters - the sheriff's deputy, the head of Global Dynamics, and the scheming town psychiatrist - are played by attractive, intelligent women. Disappointingly, almost all of the actual scientists are played by men. Even if that's true in "real life," there's no reason that a humorous fantasy-sci fi TV show can't make their head particle physicist a woman.
Anyway, there was an episode a couple of weeks ago that did change it up a bit. One of the plots featured the Tesla High School science fair, where the students create Nobel-prize caliber projects. Zoe, the sheriff's daughter, comes into conflict with the school's "Heathers." In Eureka the trend-setting bullying popular clique are three girls whose inventions win MacArthur "genius" awards. It's a high school where smart = cool.
The feud spills over into the science fair with experimental sabotage. Ultimately Zoe and head "Heather" Megan have to work together to save the town. Yes, it's corny, but I found it refreshing to see high school girls who are brilliant at science and engineering depicted as the rule, rather than the exception.
Other clips with Zoe and Megan:
Tags: Eureka, science for girls, women in science
Watch video clip starting at 6:40 time remaining.
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