Janet L. Stoner received both her Bachelor of Science in Physical Education in 1970 and Masters of Science in Mathematics in 1972 from Florida State University. Since leaving FSU, her career path led to being a teacher in the Leon County School System for two years and then as an Engineer Assistant at Texaco in New Orleans, Louisiana. She recently retired from being Vice President of Texaco Inc., where she was responsible for worldwide human resources.

Stoner’s interests are applied math and engineering. While receiving her Masters in Mathematics, she concentrated on theoretical math. She used math to get to other places and liked the reasoning part of math and the challenge of it. Stoner enjoyed math and had good teachers along the way to encourage and support her, which includes her freshmen calculus teacher at FSU, Dr. Gilmer. Her scientific interests lean more towards engineering than science. Even though she enjoys biology, chemistry, physics and the inductive reasoning in those fields, engineering teaches you how to put things together. She enjoys problem solving. There were a few challenges she had to overcome while working at Texaco. She had to be taken seriously as a professional. When she started at Texaco, the only women there were secretaries, not engineers. Others did not take many women seriously because of gender. She had to progress professionally and had to be mobile, moving every two and half years of her career. She also had to be recognized by her peers without having an engineering degree.

Stoner achieved her goal by listening and learning from others, even though it was recommended by others to take time off and receive her engineering degree. If she had taken this route, there would be the chance of missed opportunity when it came to promotions and experience. It was also a challenge to become the supervisor of someone who she used to work for and to leave the security of home. While on assignment in such places like Scotland, South America, and Africa, she learned how the world looks at the U.S. and it gave her a broader appreciation of others in the world.

She is a member of various organizations, which include Phi Kappa Phi and Pi Mu Epsilon organizations she joined while at FSU. Stoner has also given various speeches. One of her many acknowledgements includes being a recipient of the FSU “Grad Made Good” Award. In her spare time, she likes to spend time with her two dogs, swim, sail, and go fishing, golf, and now she is learning how to garden. She is involved with non-profit organizations and hopes one day that all women in math, science, and engineering fields will have women mentors.