Junior Secondary School, Gwarinmpa, Abuja, represented by Miss Zainab Wakili has emerged winner of the Sheengineer Invent It, Build It students workshop/STEM competition, sponsored by the Royal Academy of Engineering, UK.
Junior Secondary School Area 11 came second, while Model Secondary School, Maitama came third.
Speaking at the ceremony in Abuja recently, the Director and Grant Awadee Sheengineer Invent It, Build It’, Dr. Felicia Agubata said the workshop for junior secondary school students is aimed at igniting their passion in STEM, inspire them to be creative and innovative, as well as pursue a career in engineering.
“Our aim is to encourage girls to enter and stay in STEM careers through this project and our areas of focus are start young which ensure that girls are shielded from believing that they are less intellectually capable and therefore less suited for STEM, challenging stereotypes by exposing children to examples of women who have succeeded in STEM.”
Other programmes are redesigning our education system through encouraging female students in secondary schools, motivating them, taking their questions seriously in class and ensuring that they see the possibilities of STEM careers, introducing policies and incentives for women who want to join a STEM career, collecting data and exposing gender gaps, monitoring gender gaps closely and highlighting differences in the experiences by key stakeholders, finding creative ways to encourage STEM and promote awareness, among others.
“Educational institutions, governments, corporate bodies, our society at large, are in a great position to dispel stereotypes that discourage females from joining STEM careers. One of the best ways of doing that is by dedicating resources to creating an environment that nurtures and support STEM education,” Agubata, who is also the immediate-past President of the Association of Professional Women in Engineering (APWEN) stressed.
The Sheengineer Invent It, Build It students workshop/STEM competition, the director noted, is sponsored by Royal Academy of Engineering, UK with University of West of Scotland as its UK partner and Tributary Learning Initiative as its Nigerian partner.
She thanked the academy for igniting the passion of STEM in young African females.
The winner of the competition, Miss Zainab Wakili said, “I want to be the first female engineer to design a machine to aid the elderly in our society.“
