COEUR d'ALENE — Computers are not smart.

It's the coders and programmers running the systems who are the true brains behind the gadgets.

This concept was demonstrated in a most delicious and gloppy way Wednesday as Mary Everett, a University of Idaho Coeur d'Alene computer science doctorate student, acted as a pizza-making robot following instructions written by high school students attending the Women in Science and Engineering Day on the North Idaho College campus.

"Computers are dumb," Everett said. "They need exact instructions and there's a lot of trial and error in processing to getting instructions correctly in engineering. You have to be very specific with computers, especially robots, because they will take everything you say literally. The engineering process is one where you're iterating constantly, figuring out what you did wrong and trying again."

Sometimes the students' instructions were detailed enough to make a little cheese pizza. Sometimes they were missing steps, hence the black garbage bag Everett wore as a protective covering to conduct the sloppy experiment in the name of science.

"You have to be very specific," said Sienna Streeter, a junior at Mullan Junior/Senior High School. "You can't just do what you would normally tell a human to do because they don't have the knowledge that we do."

Streeter said she was happy to attend the day of workshops focused on science, technology, engineering and math, the STEM subjects. Although she said she is not sure what career she will pursue when she graduates, she loves mathematics and is currently in pre-calculus.

"I've gone back and forth," Streeter said. "I want to do ultrasound tech, cosmetology or something to do with math."

In the BristleBots workshop, students puzzled over household items and minimal electronics to make their own personalized handheld robots.

Lakeside High School 10th grader Kimberly Pluff immediately went to work building her bot. She said she was enjoying the science-filled day.

“I thought it just sounded really cool,” she said.

Sitting next to her was fellow Lakeside sophomore Tylah Lambert, who said she is interested in going into environmental law after high school. Lambert said she appreciated the opportunity to participate in the Women in Science and Engineering Day.

"It’s really cool," she said. "I like that it was only a women’s thing, that all the women got to come."

About 100 high school students from across North Idaho participated in the workshops, which also included forensic science work with Idaho State Police and "The Power of Patterns" station to help understand how identifying patterns can offer solutions in modern technology. Most participants were female, but all were welcome.

University of Idaho Coeur d'Alene computer science undergraduate Lacey Hunt said the Women in Science and Engineering program is encouraging for students and ignites sparks in them.

"When I was in high school, I would have loved to come to something like this and be exposed to a bunch of different fields that I probably otherwise wouldn't have," she said.