Published:
Heriot-Watt's School of Mathematical and Computer Science took part in the recent 'Girls into a digital world' event which was hosted by Skills Development Scotland (SDS).
36 school girls, aged 13 and 14 from seven different schools in Edinburgh, were picked by their high schools to attend the event as they were potentially interested in technology and computing as a career choice.
Our purpose was to provide a chance to experience university life and meet with and chat to positive role models in the department. This was a massively successful day and one that we intend to repeat.
The Computer Science department hosted one afternoon of a three day event wherein Microsoft, RBS and Edinburgh College were also involved. Dr Tessa Berg and Dr Diana Bental organised the Heriot-Watt event with support from colleagues and undergraduate students in Computer Science.
The current undergraduate students were very active in organising a challenge for the school girls and putting together a variety of tasks and materials to use on the day. One 1st year student, Lauren Campbell, created a website for the school girls to use and gather information from, and a group of students at various stages of their degree created a coding task for the high school pupils to complete during the school visit.
The girls were welcomed by the Head of Computer Science, Professor Andrew Ireland, and the welcome address given by one of Heriot-Watt's female Professors, Fairouz Kameraddine. The day also included a tour of the Edinburgh Campus, a tour of the robotics lab, a networking lunch and Computer Science themed goody bags.
Dr Tessa Berg said, "At present females represent a marginalized community within the ICT sector and this needs to change. We wanted to show teenage girls that computing is a great career choice and one they should definitely consider. This initiative gave the girls an opportunity to meet our female students who study computer science.
"Our purpose was to provide a chance to experience university life and meet with and chat to positive role models in the department. This was a massively successful day and one that we intend to repeat."
Special thanks to the current undergraduate students who gave their support on the day, in particular to Lauren Campbell, Helen Rankin, Emma Ferguson and Vindhya Liyanage.
The school girls said:
"University is actually an option for me now."
"I would definitely like to study here."
"I really enjoyed seeing all the labs, the robots were awesome."
"I loved all the university stuff in the goodie bags."
"Thank you for doing this, I think I shall come back when I am older."
"I now really really want to be a programmer."