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Thales Supports National Women in Engineering Day

Thales is proud to be supporting National Women in Engineering Day (NWED) on 23 June. Thales is sponsoring two events to mark the occasion; the Institution of Engineering and Technology’s (IET) Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards and the Royal Aeronautical Society’s (RAeS) Women in Aviation & Aerospace Amy Johnson Lecture. It will also be hosting events for female students at Prospects College of Advanced Technology (PROCAT), and at the Crawley and Glasgow sites.
 

The IET Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards

The IET Young Woman Engineer of the Year Awards honour the remarkable achievements of the very best early career female engineers working in the UK today. With deadline for entries on 30 June, the categories are split amongst Young Woman Engineer of the Year, The Mary George Memorial Prize for Apprentices and the Women’s Engineering Society Prize.
Click here for more information
 

Royal Aeronautical Society’s Women in Aviation & Aerospace Amy Johnson Lecture

With this year’s date yet to be announced, the RAeS’s Women in Aviation & Aerospace Amy Johnson Lecture features guest speakers and panellists from a range of companies within the aforementioned sectors, debating the progress that has been made with diversity in these typically male dominated industries over the years.
You can find more information here
 

Prospects College of Advanced Technology (PROCAT) Visit

Girls and young people alike will gain a great insight into engineering careers at PROCAT’s WIE Open Days on 21 and 23 June, held at its Basildon campus. Attendees will have the opportunity to hear from a number of female Thales engineers and young apprentices about what it’s like to study STEM subjects and work in an engineering business. They’ll learn all about the benefits that this career pathway offers as well as the exciting projects that our speakers get to work on with customers such as London Underground, Eurostar and Network Rail. The Year 10 visitors will also see the Thales apprentices demonstrate some of the test projects they have worked on using the real rail track that is set up in the Rail Academy to assist hands-on learning.
 

Crawley and Glasgow Sites Networking Day

Female students will be paying the Crawley and Glasgow sites a visit on 23 June. Students will be able to watch presentations given by senior female engineers, have the chance to network, take a tour of the site, learn about the process of becoming an apprentice or graduate and partake in a session on how to successfully apply for engineering jobs.

Thales is delighted to be playing a part in these events for NWED. Set up by the Women’s Engineering Society (WES), the day focuses attention on the great opportunities within engineering that are on offer to women, at a time when it has never been more important to address the engineering skills shortage. Encouraging women into engineering careers not only increases diversity and inclusion, but helps to fill the substantial future job opportunities that have been predicted in the sector.

Victor Chavez, CEO Thales UK, says, “Women amount for 51% of the working population in the UK, but only around 20% of our Thales UK employees are female, so obviously we want to see that number increase, but of course we are in part impacted by the gender bias in the education system regarding the numbers of women who study science and engineering subjects. Getting that gender balance addressed is a huge priority to us and the broader engineering community around the UK.”

Thales has supported several schemes in the past to address the gender imbalance in engineering, such as working with organisations including Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) and Engineering UK, whose aim is to inspire girls and women to study and build careers using STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) subjects. These organisations assist Thales with shaping its activities in schools, as a means of creating gender neutral engagements with young people.

For more information on National Women in Engineering Day, click here