Our Associate Director, Nina Heavyside, and Design Engineer, Gavin Pillinger, presented to Year 10 students at Channing School for Girls keen to study STEM related subjects at A-level. They were amongst several others providing insights into their profession at the careers day. Nina and Gavin shared their stories on how they embarked on a career in structural engineering and discussed the benefits of studying STEM related subjects.

One of the students shared their feedback after the event:

On Thursday, we were fortunate enough to have Ms Nina Heavyside and Mr Gavin Pillinger talk to us about a career in engineering. Girls were seldom encouraged into engineering historically, Ms Heavyside told us, and the industry suffers because of it. She advised us to keep our career paths open by choosing STEM A-levels while Mr Pillinger spoke about how his degree in Engineering and Architecture allowed him to retain his creative expression, which he also feels in his job as a structural engineer. Recent graduates into their firm describe a ratio of 3:7 of women to men in engineering lectures at university – which is an increase from previous years – showing why it’s so vital for us to champion the STEM subjects. We also discussed alternative paths into engineering such as apprenticeships plus the advantages of a chartership against a PhD. It was an incredibly engaging talk and we all greatly appreciated the advice and knowledge we gained.