Women in STEM

At the end of Term 2, myself and 10 other girls attended the annual Women in STEM as sponsored by Ford.

Throughout the conference, we participated in several interactive programmes and listened to women speak about their personal experiences in the workforce and what made them achieve the goals in life they had set for themselves.

Among these women were engineers, senior market researchers and senior developers, who employed their skills in lots of unique and sustainable ways.

One of these women was Emma Peel, who was a representative engineer at Ford. These women were extraordinarily inspiring and enthusiastic about the many opportunities and experiences so readily available to us.

They highlighted their struggles and truly inspired myself and the others to pursue STEM and be comfortable in it. Throughout the conference, I learnt the flexibility in engineering and the positivity that can come from many peers. 

However, with all the good comes some bad. Although some of the expert speakers spoke of their positions of women in power in an enlightening way, a lot of them outlined the occasional rift in their path and their struggle in finding their footing in a male dominated work-place.

Luckily enough, they all reported that as the years progress, equal numbers in said workplaces are steadily becoming the norm. 

I am so incredibly grateful for the opportunity given to me to attend this meeting and I implore girls pursuing STEM to attend this if given the opportunity.

A huge thank you also to Mrs Geary, Mrs Hacking and Mrs Holt for organising and supervising throughout the day.

Amaia McCallum, Year 10