On Thursday 18th July 3 of our members spent the day at a local secondary school interviewing year 10 students as part of a Futures Day. Students had “applied” for a job, completed a letter of application and CV and were then interviewed for the posts by ourselves and about 25 other people. It was a very enjoyable, and in some cases, eye opening day for us and the students.
On Wednesday 3rd July we were delighted to welcome Helen Gray (BEng, MBA, CEng FIMMM) to our meeting. She delivered an inspirational talk about here life as a metallurgist. She left school with few qualifications and returned to education around the age of 26. Having completed sufficient qualifications to allow her to apply to university she eventually graduated with a first class honours degree in Materials Engineering. She has had a varied and successful career in the steel industry, often being the only woman in a very male dominated environment. She is real role model for girls, showing that even if you leave school with few qualifications it does not necessarily mean you can’t return, and succeed, in education at a later time. Nor does working in a male dominated industry mean you can’t succeed! Helen’s determination and ability to deal with some extremely difficult situations was awesome.