[C]umbria has led the way on a national campaign for International Women in Engineering Day on 23 June.
Hundreds of people across the region have showed their support for the ‘Raising the Bar’ campaign by proudly holding a ‘selfie card’ to promote equality, diversity and inclusion within the engineering profession.
Supporters include the MP’s for Copeland, Allerdale and Carlisle, the new Managing Director of the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership, Copeland Borough Council, business leaders, education providers and engineers throughout the region.
The new Women in Nuclear (WiN) Cumbria branch has led the campaign, with the support of Sellafield Ltd and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.
The theme for this year’s campaign was ‘Raising the Bar’.
Chair of WiN Cumbria, Claire Gallery-Strong, said; “The WiN Cumbria team is overwhelmed by the response to the campaign and the fact that it has canvassed such strong support across the county.
“It has given companies across the UK a platform to make the female role models within their companies visible. It is not just about WiN Cumbria, it is ‘Team Cumbria’, men, women, parents, teachers, mentors – all working together to support the future of our industry and region.
“We have moved on from making the business case for diversity – the data is there to show us that having different people with diverse ideas and skills enhances business performance and makes economic sense for the UK.
“Now it is time to make it happen.
“It even successfully captured my little girl’s imagination and got her designing her own selfie card.”
International Women in Engineering Day is an international awareness campaign, under UNESCO patronage, to raise the profile of women in engineering and focuses attention on the career opportunities available to girls in industry. It celebrates the outstanding achievements of women engineers throughout the world.