We celebrated International Women’s Day through a two-day virtual conference on 25th and 26th March 2021, with the themes of ‘Ethnic Minority Women in STEMM’, and ‘Future Directions and Priorities for Women in STEMM’. This was a unique opportunity to challenge existing gender and ethnic disparities in STEMM, whilst celebrating and being inspired by the journeys of role models in the field of science and engineering.
The two-day conference involved 4 keynote speeches, presentations, two workshops and a panel discussion. There were speakers from Queen Mary and elsewhere, including some based in Spain, Bangladesh, USA and Canada. They were truly inspiring as they shared their work and career experiences with the delegates, which included the next generation of STEMM professionals at QMUL and beyond. The committee members were honoured to facilitate the thought-provoking discussions. The two interactive workshops were about creating greater self-awareness and networking skills for career development.
We saw participation from 137 attendees from diverse disciplines and career stages across the two days and had very positive feedback from them. One attendee commented ”this conference was the most inspiring conference I have ever attended…speakers’ energy was perfect, and their knowledge made me feel stronger- like I can succeed in whatever I want”. Another attendee loved the “wide range of topics covered” and felt that it was “great to hear from speakers from a range of backgrounds and professions”, with other comments asking for “a similar event next year”!
This conference was an entire team effort, with the committee arranging everything from the programme, publicity, and production of the event. The organising committee found the experience to be very positive and learnt plenty of new skills working as a virtual team from many disciplines and learning how to put on a virtual event. We will be planning more, smaller scale events over the coming year.