When I reflect on this year’s women’s history month theme, “Working to Form a More Perfect Union: Honoring Women in Public Service and Government,” I am inspired by the women here at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) who have made vital contributions to public service, intellectual property, invention, and innovation. These are women such as Marilyn Ricks-Beach, who we have highlighted in our Women’s History month video, and who exemplifies dedication to federal service, having worked at the USPTO since 1980. You can read more about the USPTO’s women employees on the All in STEM page of the USPTO website, which is part of the USPTO’s broader campaign to encourage more women and girls to go in to STEM fields and stay in them.

Recently, I’ve had the honor of swearing in three outstanding women as regional office directors: Christal Sheppard, Director of the Elijah J. McCoy Midwest Regional Office in Detroit; Hope Shimabuku, Director of our Texas Regional Office in Dallas; and Molly Kocialski, Director of the Rocky Mountain Regional Office in Denver. In addition to embodying the spirit of the theme of this year’s Women’s History Month—public service—Christal, Hope, and Molly are trailblazers who have set high standards for excellence and achievement throughout this agency. They take their places as part of an executive team that is 41 percent female, which as compared to the national rate of women executives at 15 percent, shows the progress we are making at the agency of encouraging inclusive practices.

The USPTO has long valued the vital contributions of women in intellectual property, invention, and innovation. Take, for instance, Mary Dixon Kies, who in 1809 became the first American woman to receive a U.S. patent, or Sarah Mather, who was granted a patent in 1845 for her invention of a submarine telescope. We’ve also witnessed innovation from within the walls of our own agency. While serving in her role as a copyist at the Patent Office in Washington, D.C., Clara Barton joined forces with the wife of a patent examiner, Joseph Fales, to assist in the care of wounded Civil War soldiers. This, in part, helped her to discover her life’s work and to first imagine the humanitarian benefits of medical care for veterans and relief for thousands of refugees from natural disasters ultimately resulting in her founding the American Red Cross. In many ways, we stand on the shoulders of women like Kies, Mather, and Barton, whose ingenuity, creativity, and inventions have inspired us, and improved our lives.

I look forward to inducting Radia Perlman and Harriet Strong into the National Inventors Hall of Fame this year. Perlman holds over 100 patents, and played a key role in driving the growth and development of the Internet and transforming Ethernet into a technology that can create large networks. Strong was a trailblazer and entrepreneur in the late 1800s and received a patent for her invention of a system of dams and reservoirs for water storage and flood control. And this spring, I will join President Obama at the White House to honor Dr. Nancy Ho, a winner of the National of Medal of Technology and Innovation, for her DNA research, which has resulted in ways to create ethanol from plants, advancing renewable biofuels and bio-products.

I’m inspired by these women inventors as well as the next generation of innovators. I’m so proud to lead an agency that values the contributions of its employees regardless of who they are, or what their background is. And while we celebrate the legacy of success that we all inherited from the women who came before us, we all have the same obligation to foster and support the next generation of women leaders in our organization. They will be critical to the USPTO’s success for many years to come.