It’s been a busy three years since IEEE Ladies in Engineering celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary in 2022.
WIE facilitates the recruitment and retention of ladies in technical disciplines all over the world. It additionally works to encourage women to pursue an engineering profession. There are pupil chapters at universities across the globe. Males might be a part of the affinity group as nicely.
Ladies make up lower than a 3rd of the world’s workforce in technology-related fields, based on a report by the World Financial institution Group.
WIE has launched a number of applications targeted on rising the variety of girls within the science, know-how, engineering, and math fields. The brand new initiatives embrace grants and management applications, and several other contests have been launched to encourage and assist feminine college students who’re contemplating a STEM profession.
The group’s onerous work is paying off. Winnie Ye, the present WIE chair and an electronics professor at Carleton College, which is simply south of Ottawa, reviews that, as of February, the variety of members and pupil members was up over the identical interval final yr. There are greater than 28,800 members, a year-over-year improve larger than 17 %. Scholar membership, at almost 21,000, is up by roughly the identical share. There at the moment are greater than 1,100 affinity teams.
“Regardless of this progress, attracting and retaining paying members stays a problem, significantly as college students transition to skilled membership,” Ye says. “Making certain long-term engagement requires demonstrating clear worth by means of profession improvement, networking, and management alternatives.”
A day of celebration, grants, and management coaching
Most of the new applications have been launched beneath Celia Shahnaz’s management. The WIE committee’s first elected chair, Shahnaz served in 2023 and 2024. In 2022 the committee made the chair an elected place.
Shahnaz has been a WIE volunteer for greater than 20 years. She established the primary WIE group within the IEEE Bangladesh Part in 2010 and have become its first chair. The IEEE senior member is a professor {of electrical} and digital engineering on the Bangladesh College of Engineering and Know-how, in Dhaka.
She says she is most happy with bringing again the annual IEEE WIE Day, held on 29 June, the date the group was formally established in 1997.
“The day is a member-engaging occasion focusing on membership improvement and membership retention,” Shahnaz says. Actions embrace networking occasions, seminars, and workshops.
This yr’s theme is Pioneering Protected Our on-line world: Bridging Know-how and Gentle for Safety.
For some teams, at some point will not be sufficient, so WIE Day occasions stretch out over a number of weeks. The inaugural occasion held in 2023 featured greater than 120 actions worldwide. The quantity almost doubled final yr, with over 230 occasions. This yr’s celebrations are scheduled to kick off on 23 June, to coincide with Worldwide Ladies in Engineering Day, then finish on 7 July.
The IEEE WIE Household Cares grant program was established to financially help members with caregiving duties to allow them to attend an IEEE convention. A grant offers as much as US $1,000 to cowl bills associated to caring for kids, senior residents, and members of the family who’re disabled. The grant is sponsored by the IEEE Basis.
To maintain its members up to date on business tendencies, in addition to analysis outcomes and their sensible functions, WIE has partnered with a number of IEEE societies and councils to supply a digital Distinguished Lecturers program. Greater than 20 teams have supplied audio system, together with the Pc Society, Energy Electronics Society, and Sensors Council.
“I wish to actually strengthen WIE management with the area people in order that we will present extra focused sources and assist girls.” —Winnie Ye
There’s additionally the brand new Trade Specialists Community, a worldwide database of business professionals, researchers, and leaders who will be known as upon to take part in an occasion.
“For any of our occasions, we will entry this checklist of wonderful individuals, who we will ask to offer talks and provide workshops and seminars,” Ye says. A number of WIE applications are targeted on offering girls with management expertise. Lower than 10 % of ladies maintain positions comparable to CIO, CTO, and IT supervisor, or function technical crew leaders, based on this yr’s Ladies in Tech Stats report.
The WIE Worldwide Management Summits, that are held all over the world, present alternatives for networking, mentorship, and collaboration. Eight have been held final yr, and 7 are scheduled for this yr in international locations together with Jordan, Pakistan, Poland, and the USA.
The WIE Discussion board USA East helps its attendees develop and enhance their management expertise by means of talks by profitable leaders. This yr’s occasion is scheduled to be held from 6 to eight November in Arlington, Va.
Ye says she is most excited in regards to the return of WIE’s Worldwide Management Convention. After a two-year absence, the occasion is scheduled to be held on 15 and 16 Might in San Jose, Calif. The theme is Accelerating Management in an AI-Powered World. Registration is now open.
STEM-related contests
A number of contests have been launched to encourage younger girls to pursue a STEM profession, Shahnaz says. Ladies make up about 35 % of STEM graduates—a gender disparity that hasn’t modified prior to now 10 years, based on UNESCO’s 2024 World Training Monitoring Report.
Held for the primary time in 2023, the WIE Local weather Tech Large Thought Pitch competitors encourages feminine engineering college students and researchers to be entrepreneurial and is designed to extend the variety of technical startups led by girls.
“I actually needed to encourage girls to construct their capability utilizing their technical data {and professional} expertise to be a startup founder,” Shahnaz says. “We needed them to give you an answer to climate-change-related issues and showcase their enterprise concepts and fashions. We additionally needed to nurture the expertise of ladies in all membership grades together with senior members, Fellows, and life Fellows.”
Within the 2023 contest, a crew of engineering college students from the Bangladesh College of Engineering and Know-how gained first place within the impression class for its design of a bamboo filter for diesel engines.
There have been 60 submissions that first yr, and the quantity doubled final yr. The deadline for submissions for this yr’s contest will likely be introduced quickly.
Capitalizing on the recognition of manga comics and graphic novels with younger individuals, WIE launched a contest in 2023 to seek out the best-written manga that centered on Riko-chan, a fictional character who’s a preuniversity pupil. Riko-chan makes use of STEM instruments to assist clear up on a regular basis issues. Greater than 40 individuals participated within the 2023 contest, and there have been 81 submissions final yr. Their tales can be found to learn on-line, and lots of have been translated into 9 languages together with French, Hindi, and Spanish.
“We see this contest as a possibility to showcase the varied function fashions in engineering know-how,” Ye says. “The objective is to spark curiosity amongst our youthful viewers and make STEM fields extra relatable and extra thrilling for them.”
This yr’s manga competitors is now accepting submissions. Try the guidelines and deadlines on the WIE web site.
Mentoring and outreach applications
A brand new mentoring program is within the works, Ye says.
“We wish to actually create an energetic mentor-mentee matching and engagement platform inside the WIE neighborhood,” she says.
As a part of her imaginative and prescient for a extra engaged and inclusive neighborhood, she has launched the WIE Ambassador program. The initiative is designed to empower devoted WIE members to advocate for IEEE’s mission globally. The ambassadors can promote WIE initiatives, set up native occasions, and encourage extra girls to pursue STEM careers, Ye says.
She emphasizes the significance of increasing WIE’s presence in underrepresented areas comparable to China and South Africa.
“Throughout my time period,” she says, “I’m dedicated to increasing our presence in these areas. I wish to actually strengthen WIE management with the area people in order that we will present extra focused sources and assist girls. We wish to ensure that they’re conscious of us and turn into extra energetic.”
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