AEF CAMPAIGN CONNECTION
“The girls get to meet a bunch of female engineers. They see women can do these roles just as well as men can and are
comfortable doing them”
D’ANDRE WILSON-IHEJIRIKA, P.ENG. Operation SMART
they’re getting, either subliminally or directly, is that science isn’t something that girls are good at, that they do, or should want to do. We want the girls to develop the strength and the skills to make their own decisions.”
IT’S COMPLICATED
After taking part in Operation SMART, 11-year-old Gabriella Gonza- lez isn’t ready to commit to an engineering career just yet. But she has a much better appreciation for what Professional Engineers do. “I would describe engineers as complicated,” she says. And her love of science is growing. “My favourite activity was when we got to build a structure out of spaghetti and marshmallows. The building we made was really tall but it wasn’t very stable,” she says. Still, her team learned a valuable lesson from that miscalculation: triangles are the strongest shape. “You learn something new in every class,” she says. “It’s fun to solve problems using my own ideas and creativity.”
FAN GIRL Applying electric circuit concepts to build a battery powered fan. -photo courtesy Girls Inc.
WINTER 2015 PEG | 17
Made with FlippingBook flipbook maker