A group set up by students from the University of Aberdeen to encourage more young people, particularly girls, to develop an interest in science and technology is being supported by city businesswoman Jeanette Forbes.
Robogals is an international student-run organisation that aims to inspire, engage and empower young women to consider studying engineering and related fields by conducting interactive, engineering and science based workshops in local schools.
Established in 2008 it now has more than 30 chapters across 10 countries. The University of Aberdeen chapter was set up earlier this year.
“I got to know about this group when they contacted me and we had a brief meeting at Aberdeen University,” said Jeanette, CEO of PCL Group. “I was really impressed with what they were trying to achieve and that they had started up the group, volunteering their own time to set it up with very little resource. I just had to get involved and try and help them achieve their goal.”
“I firmly believe that our Oil & Gas sector, whilst going through challenging times, still provides excellent, long-term career opportunities for our young people who are the future pioneers. Developments in technology means that the dynamics and skills requirement of the industry is changing, and I do all I can to encourage young women, in particular, to give serious consideration to the energy sector as an exciting and worthwhile career which can benefit from their skills and provide them with great opportunities.
“Robogals was set up at the University of Melbourne to provide an opportunity for students and young professionals to encourage children to look at the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and maths) in a different way by showing them it was fun. It particularly provided youngsters with female role models who could show them what could be achieved irrespective of their gender.”
The chapter at Aberdeen University was set up earlier this year after Laura Ong, a second year chemical engineering student, and two of her friends attended a Robogals convention in Cambridge.
“We didn’t really know what we were getting into, but thought it was worth going to the convention to find out more – and we all wanted to visit Cambridge University,” said Laura, who comes from Malaysia.
“We came back really enthused and decided we didn’t just want to sign up as volunteers, we wanted to set up a new chapter. We started with just four on the committee but we recently held a recruitment drive and we have 15 new volunteers who all want to get involved.
“We would have really struggled without the help we’ve received from Jeanette. She has really enabled us and supported us not only by providing equipment for the Chapter but also through mentoring and giving us advice.
“We can’t thank her enough for her help. We recently had a stand at Techfest and it went really well – far better than we would ever have expected. There were people queuing to visit us and find out what we were about.”
Activities on the day included conducting coding workshops with the aid of a Raspberry Pi and a Unicorn HAT (an 8×8 LED matrix) – and utilising a Makey Makey with bananas to make music to illustrate the concept of circuits.
“From starting up just a few months ago, we are fully booked up for workshops until November,” said Laura. “Our first workshop will be at Seaton Primary where we will teach them about liquids and gases – but in a fun way by building a lava lamp.”